The full text of our sponsorship application for the series for summer of 2008-2009 :

About the 2007-2008 Trek Summer Sprint Series

The TSSS was run over the nominal 'summer' of 2007-2008, being October
to April, once a month (skipping January).

It was run at the Blackburn Cycling Club velodrome, and was a unique
series, allowing track riders of varying abilities and experience the
chance to compete in match (Olympic) sprint races.  As far as we know
the format used is unique at least in Australia, being a graded round
robin, allowing many riders a chance to gain experience and skill at
this very exciting and challenging track racing discipline.

The series started slowly, round one had 9 riders competing, round two
was washed out, round three had seven riders, but round four had
eighteen, round five seventeen and the final round six had fifteen.

The series website is online here :

     http://sss.aboc.com.au/

Statistics for site visits are here :

     http://sss.aboc.com.au/admin/logs/

The total number of site visits is 19,398 as at May 10th 2008.

The series gained momentum as word spread, and a typical example of
feedback is :

Hi Carl,

Just dropping a quick line to say thanks for the great day yesterday.
It was my first crack at match sprinting and I had a blast and learnt
so much. Shame about the numbers, but you guys did a fantastic job
and it'd have to be one of the best run events I've been to.

Hopefully we'll get some more numbers, the only suggestion I can make
is to hassle the guys who run various websites to put reminders up
the week before. As I said, I'm now going to be running the CCCC
website so I'll make sure it is on there, the other sites I'd suggest
are the various clubs:

www.brunswickcyclingclub.com <http://www.brunswickcyclingclub.com> www.bbn.org.au <http://www.bbn.org.au>

as well as some track specific sites that may pull in a few people:

http://www.fyxomatosis.com/ www.fixed.org.au
<http://www.fixed.org.au>

Well done once again, I think it's a pretty unique series and would really like to see it take off because you've obviously put a lot of
 effort into it. I'll be in touch again to order some prints, once
I've waded through all the photos!

Cheers, - Adam

The organisers had event results and photographs online on the site
website on the evening of the day that the race meetings were run. Noted
were placed on many Internet forums and chat groups through the season
and were received with considerable enthusiasm.  For example on the
track bike website fixed.org.au :

> I had a go at the TSSS final round last Sunday, and I have to say
> that it was the most enjoyable day of bike racing I've ever had. It
> was friendly and fun! You don't need to be an aspiring Bayley or Hoy
> to enjoy this event. It was all very relaxed, even with good humoured
> jokes coming over the fence as opponents stalked each other at low
> speed.

Kudos to the people who organised and ran it - especially Carl!

If you thought you'd like to have a go at match sprinting, or even
thought you might make time to attend this unique event - make sure
you do it next season! I'm sure you'll get hooked - like I did.

http://fixed.org.au/forums/index.php?topic=3808.0
http://fixed.org.au/forums/index.php?topic=3820.0

We're hoping that for 2008-2009 the series will start with greater
numbers.  The nature of the series is such that we're limited to 30
riders per round or we can't give them all a fair chance to get enough
racing in to make the day worthwhile. The series is more about
participation and gaining experience at a rare branch of the sport than
about elite riders winning swags of cash.  It's a feature of the series
that any consistent rider from any grade is capable of winning - the
series was tied in the end between an elite A grade rider and a rider
who progressed from C grade to B grade, and we had to split them on a
formula using flying 200 qualifying times.  This was exactly the sort of
finish we were hoping for.  The competition for the Trek T1 track frame was fiercely contested and the per round aggregate prizes (pair of Bontrager race-lite tyres) were very well received.  Most track riders also ride and race roadbikes, so there's a fair level of crossover between road and track, and the Race-lite tyres are now on a number of bikes that wouldn't otherwise have tried the tyres.

Match sprinting is a branch of track cycling that most riders very
rarely get a chance to compete in, generally most clubs don't run it at
regular races and only elite level riders get to race match sprints at
events such as the Revolution series at Vodafone, the Olympic games and
track world cup rounds.  We wanted to allow 'the rest of us' a chance to
compete in a series and to give those who wanted to do match sprinting
but weren't Olympic athletes something to aim for and train for.  The
momentum we gained as the series ran through last summer is something
that benefited the riders who competed and a number of them have set the
series as their major goal for next summer.

We believe the format is successful and we're thrilled to have had Trek's support for the previous season and would be delighted if Trek would support the series again in summer 2008-2009.  We have permission from the Blackburn Cycling Club to run the series again at the Blackburn velodrome next summer and aboc Cycle Coaching will continue to provide event support in the form of providing the free BBQ for riders, spectators and officials and logistics and event management.

We have prepared some promotional material, we had official sunhats for
the last series, photographs are here :

http://sss.aboc.com.au/Members/carl/tsss-aboc-hats-done/image/image_view_fullscreen

And promotional cards and posters, provisional on Trek's agreement to
support the series again in summer 2008-2009 :

http://sss.aboc.com.au/Members/carl/TSSS-flyer-2008-2009.pdf

We're hoping that Trek will again provide 6 pairs of Bontrager Race-Lite road clinchers for daily aggregate prizes and a major prize of a Trek T1 frame or a pair of Bontrager Track wheels as the major series prize in return for naming rights for Summer 2008-2009.

Thankyou

Carl Brewer
Race Director, Trek Summer Sprint Series 2007-2008 and 2008-2009