Darren Lomman

In 2003, when 19 year old engineering student Darren Lomman discovered the greatest wish of his paraplegic friend Shane Thompson was to ride a motor bike again, he immediately set about turning that dream into a reality.

Between full-time study and part-time work, Darren spent all his spare time over three years in his parents back shed researching, engineering and developing a hand controlled motorcycle, which was licensed and on the road early this year.

He found great satisfaction and motivation in using his engineering skills to enrich the lives of people with disabilities and formed his own company, Dreamfit. To encourage more young engineers to use their talent to design and build disability friendly equipment, he negotiated a collaboration with the engineering department at the University of Western Australia.

UWA engineering projects are now used to design and build custom recreational equipment for people with disabilities; 2006 projects include a hovercraft with wheelchair access and a ski boat with an onboard crane to lift people in and out. To enable as many people as possible to benefit from the student’s work, Darren founded the Disabled Recreation Club and organised for Dreamfit to donate the equipment to the Club.

In 2005 Darren was named Young Bio-Medical Engineer of the Year, in 2006 he was recognized as the Young Person of the Year at the Western Australian Office of Youth Awards and in 2007 he was a Young Australian of the Year finalist.