Melbourne isn’t short of showcases for sporting spectacles. ‘The Cup’ has Flemington, tennis has Rod Laver Arena, and AFL and cricket have the mighty MCG.
Yet long before the city’s esteemed Grand Prix can scream into action each year, a trendy inner-city oasis must be transformed into a world-class racing circuit. Just the thing to fuel two of Charlie Schwerkolt’s prime passions – a buoyant business and very quick cars.
It is, says the sole owner and lone director of Waverley Forklifts – which nowadays has around 7,000 forklifts and associated equipment out on hire, hauled far and wide by a top-shelf fleet of Hino and Kenworth trucks in every mainland state plus the Northern Territory – his busiest week of the year.
Fair enough, but it’s quite a comment when it comes from a bloke whose everyday energy can make the Eveready Bunny look like a sedated snail. Indeed, if there’s one word that aptly describes Charlie Schwerkolt it’d be simply ‘motion’. Or maybe two words: Mister Motion.
“Not hectic. It’s just what I do,” he tells ROADBOSS of the days before, during and after the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne’s Albert Park.
Charlie Schwerkolt’s Waverley Forklifts has around 7,000 forklifts and associated equipment out on hire, hauled far and wide in every mainland state plus the Northern Territory
Funny thing though, right at that moment we’re standing in a lane which every year supercharges almost every aspect of Charlie Schwerkolt’s life: Pit Lane, Albert Park, and despite the fact we’re talking when there are still six weeks to go before the first cars turn a wheel in anger on the six-kilometre circuit, the pace of construction already appears frenetic to the casual visitor. In this case, me!
“Believe me, this is nothing to what it’ll be like in a few weeks from now,” he says explaining the transformation of Albert Park from a relatively serene inner-city parkland to a world-class circuit for some of the fastest cars on Earth.
“That’s when things get really busy, when all the infrastructure surrounding the circuit is put into place.”
Soon after, he slowly steers a car around the track, pointing out what goes here and there, and almost casually explaining that Waverley Forklifts will supply more than 200 pieces of equipment to the companies erecting and supplying the seemingly endless array of supporting infrastructure; everything from a wide range of on and off-road forklifts and heavy-duty handling equipment to vans for transporting work crews around various parts of the circuit.
Lifting, loading, moving and manoeuvring everything into place; the concrete barriers, safety fences, tyre stacks, seating stands, signage and every other piece of paraphernalia that it takes to create a twisted theatre for fans of the fast and the furious.
Waverley Forklifts supplies more than 200 pieces of equipment to the companies erecting and supplying the seemingly endless array of supporting infrastructure at the Melbourne Grand Prix
Not only that, he adds almost benignly, it’ll be Waverley machinery unloading the F1 cars and all their equipment from planes onto trucks and trailers, and again offloading at the business end of the event.
Then, when it’s all done and dusted, when the races have been run and won, the punters and celebrities have shuffled off and the racing elite have headed to the next lap on the map either here or overseas, the whole process starts again – this time in reverse.
So, how’d he get this gig, supplying almost every piece of materials handling equipment to the companies building the circuit?
“When Melbourne first got the Grand Prix from Adelaide in 1996, it seemed there were forklifts and bits of equipment from everywhere,” he said bluntly.
“It was chaotic so I just went in with a proposal to the Grand Prix organisers that said we could supply all the machines anyone would need to put all the infrastructure together. “We’ve been doing it ever since so we must be doing something right.”
To read the full story check out the Winter Issue of ROADBOSS Magazine, out late June. See here to sign up for a complementary subscription.
