On June 24, 2026, Ed Darmanin set out from Sydney on his Energica Xperia to attempt something that had never been done before: a solo, unassisted circumnavigation of mainland Australia by electric motorcycle. Approximately 18,000 km. Every state and territory. a bike.
The route runs counter-clockwise: north along the Queensland coast, west to the Gulf Country and the Top End, down through the Kimberley to Broome, south along the WA coast to Perth, then east across the Nullarbor through South Australia and Victoria and back to Sydney. A total of six volumes. Three of them are alone. Two riders with his wife Sally – through far north Queensland and the WA coast. One with his son Ivan, from Palm Cove via Cape Tribulation to Mount Isa in the Gulf Country.
Same Energica Xperia everywhere.
Who is Ed Darmanin?
Darmanin is a retired electrical engineer from Sydney’s Northern Beaches with over 160,000 km of personal electric vehicle experience. For the past five years, he has been riding electric motorcycles in areas no one else has touched – not as a stunt, but as a systematic exercise in what these machines can really do.
In 2022, on a Harley-Davidson LiveWire, he became the first person to cross Australia by electric motorcycle – from Sydney to Cape Tribulation, then across the Nullarbor from Perth to Sydney. That 4,500 kilometer return journey was covered by ABC News as the most read story in South Australia and the Northern Territory that day.
In 2024, he drove 5,000 kilometers from Sydney to Darwin on his Energica Xperia via Birdsville – one of the most remote towns on the continent – including a 700-kilometre drive to Mount Isa on outback roads with Ivan, where there were no electric motorcycles before. He completed it ten weeks after the heart procedure. The bike left no stone unturned.
The 2026 Big Lap is the logical next step: a complete circuit of the mainland, on the bike he knows best, with all the terrain he already understands, closing a record that never existed.
Live GPS tracking, videos and updates from the road:
