The man and an accomplice, wearing ski masks and waving machetes, stormed into a club in a western Sydney suburb shortly before 9 p.m. Wednesday and yelled at patrons to lie down as they tried to rob the cash register, police said Thursday.
About 50 members of the Southern Cross Cruiser Club had just started a club meeting in another room, and the bikers jumped up to intervene.
One robber escaped by leaping over a balcony, while the other tried to flee through a service entrance, the club's president, who identified himself only as "Jester," told Australian Broadcasting Corp.
"We caught him at the fence and crash-tackled him and hog-tied him to the ground and waited for the police to get there," Jester said.
Police confirmed that club patrons had subdued one of the robbers, who was taken to a hospital with minor injuries, but did not give further details. Police captured the other suspect nearby.
Jester said the robbers had walked past the bikers as they entered the bar but apparently failed to notice them, perhaps because the ski masks obscured their vision.
"I don't think he did his homework very well," Jester said of the ringleader. "He picked the wrong night."
