Cool and windy conditions greeted the 19 dedicated track sprinters with riders from Brunswick, Carnegie-Caulfield, Northcote and as far away as Bairnsdale-Riviera joining a strong contigent of Blackburn trackies for another exciting afternoon of match sprints.

Stand out performances were at both ends of the table with Gary Jackson making the long trip up from Bairnsdale to not only set the fastest flying 200 of the series so far, but also go through the day undefeated and take out the daily aggregate prize. Meanwhile newcomer Claire Campbell made her match sprinting debut and despite not chalking up a win, learnt a great deal and had a lot of fun in the process. Credit must again go to the race organisers for putting up an event that can cater for riders in this manner - be they experienced speedsters or track newbies.

The stiff south westerly breeze should have put a damper on any PB's in the flying 200 qualifiers but many riders took no notice of that theory and managed to achieve a personal best anyway. Gary Jackson stunned everyone, including himself, with a scorching time of 12.27 seconds averaging 58.68 kph along the way. He was joined by A grade regulars Chris Ray, Brent McKenzie and Dino Apolito who once again had the luck (or bad luck) to just scrape into the A grade cutoff. In the end Gary's speed and second kick were enough for him to beat Brent in a very close race for first place while Chris had too much power for Dino in the minor final.

B grade again provided the grading committee with the most headaches and another glut of riders in the mid to high 13 seconds mark - Martin Lama the fastest qualifier with 13.35 seconds while Chris Dann cracked B grade for the first time after setting a personal best of 13.91 seconds. When racing started however little respect was paid to qualifying times by the B grade mavericks. Chris Dann started the trend and upset a napping Martin in the first race with a great show of power at the finish. Neil Robinson, notoriously a slow qualifier and fast racer, reversed his normal pattern by doing a PB in qualifying second fastest but then failed to win a race and promptly made a bee line for the free BBQ!

Adam King then completed the disrespect for qualifying times by qualifying second slowest in the grade but going through the day undefeated beating Blackburn's Robbie Verkes in the final. Robbie jumped early, opening up what looked like a race winning gap but Adam chased deperately and overhauled Robbie at the line to record a memorable win. In the minor final Martin Lama also elected to jump early and seemed to have done young Dale Reith a favour by towing him around for a lap but Martin's renowned time trialling ability meant Dale was unable to come around his older opponent.

Close and tactical racing was the order of the day in C grade where a countback to flying 200 times was needed to determine the finalists. Nicole Holt, Greg Heasly and Julian Vince each finished the heats with two wins each meaning Nicole, the fastest qualifier was to meet Julian Vince in the major final. Julian had beaten Nicole in the third round but the final being 3 laps instead of 2 seemed to play into the hands of the more experienced Nicole, maneouvering Julian about the course and putting herself in a winning position before Julian's greater strength triumphed in the end after another very close finish. The emerging Craig Towers met Greg Heasly in the minor C grade final. Craig, despite qualifying second quickest had missed out in each of the rounds and was eager to record a win. But Greg was not so obliging, getting the jump on Craig and managing to hold Craig off with a well timed second kick on the final bend.

Debutant Claire Campbell was joined in D grade by another "young" debutant of sorts, Pat Dougherty. Pat was no stranger to the Summer Sprint Series having officiated as Chief Commisaire for the last two seasons but the graduation of Sue Dundas from commissaire school meant Pat was able to experience the racing from the other side of the judges chair.

The two newcomers were joined by Rob Wylie and Marika Kahle both of whom have also made their track sprinting debut this series. The rapidly improving Rob was the fastest qualifier dipping under 15 seconds for the first time but met his nemesis in Pat Dougherty who beat Rob in the rounds as well as the major final. The final was a very interesting race with Pat needing to show patience and perfect timing to come around Rob at the most opportune time.

Claire was growing in confidence with each race and despite apparently not having the speed to match her more experienced opponents almost upset Pat in the heats with a brave and unexpected jump that required a determined, long chase by Pat to take the win.

Marika Kahle started the day brilliantly, surging away from Pat in the first race for a strong win but a slower qualifying time meant Marika was headed for the minor not the major final at the pointy end of the day. Marika took no chances in the final against Claire, jumping early and hard to quickly open up a match winning lead which she held to the finish.

In the daily aggregate, two riders made it through undefeated, Gary Jackson in A grade and Adam King in B, Gary's flying 200 time meaning after the 0.9s per grade scale was appilied meant he won the daily aggreate of a set of Bontrager race-lite tyres.  Gary owns Riviera Cycles in Bairnsdale, so he has plenty of tyres, and donated them to the rider with the middle time, which turned out to be Adam King!  As luck would have it,  Adam needed the tyres, for the second round in a row he had to use a borrowed back wheel due to a puncture during the warmup.

The season aggregate was bound to see some changes as the leader was Barry 'The Wizard' Woods, but The Wizz was unavailable as it was his son's 2nd birthday and there are priorites greater than sprinting. We now have Greg Heasly leading the aggregate on 22 points, with the Wizz and Martin Lama on 20 and Marika Kahle on 19 points.

Our two invited juniors, Krissy Dundas and Emily Apolito again put on a great show in the Junior Invitational races held during the between the rounds break. Emily proved too quick for Krissy this time taking the invitational in a 3-0 clean sweep with each race being decided by half a wheel a race. The two girls clearly enjoying the day, approaching each race with a smile and finishing the day laughing and "carrying on like kids" showing us how just how much fun this sport can be.

Round 4 is the first Sunday of February 2009 after a layoff over January, we hope to see you all there for more summer sprinting.