Perkins wins sprint title

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It was a surprised but happy Shane Perkins who took out the men's sprint title beating Scott Sunderland 2-1in the final. Perkins' night was significantly disrupted when his opponent in the semi final, Daniel Ellis didn't show due to an earlier crash.

Ellis, last year's winner of the event crashed in his quarter final earlier in the day against Mitch Bullen damaging his left shoulder and hip, and collecting a lot of splinters. Ellis went to hospital later in the evening for x-rays on his shoulder.

Perkins said he missed not having the extra racing in his legs in the lead up to the final. "You lose a bit of the feel of the track and your confidence of being out there," he said.

As a result,  Western Australia's Sunderland was able to take the first heat off Perkins who didn't seem to have the pace coming off the final bend. Perkins, feeling better, then took the second heat comfortably. In the final heat, Sunderland threw everything at the Victorian with one lap to go but was unable to go the distance.

Perkins didn't compete in last year's track nationals through injury and also missed the chance to defend his 2009 title in the event. He told reporters it was "a great feeling" to be national champion and Australian record holder in the event once again.

"Aussie titles are really special I guess. Leading up to the world championships it's good to get a great result here and show the world that you're going well," he said. "It's been a waterline for us to see what we've got to work on. I've still got a lot of work to do but off the back of a pretty hard block I'm pretty happy to come away with a record and a gold medal."

McCulloch wins the women's 500m time trial

Kaarle McCulloch from New South Wales blitzed the opposition to take gold in the 500m time trial, with a time of 34.465, just short of her Australian record set at the championships last year. South Australia's Stephanie Morton took silver in a time of 36.005 and Western Australia's Holly Williams 37.078.

A silver medallist at last year's Commonwealth Games, McCulloch was satisfied with her performance given the event is not a current priority in her program.

"I was a bit disappointed with the first lap, I wanted to get around the low 19's – a 19.3 is not too bad..." she supposed. "It's more training for the team sprint for me. I'm not running the aero bars I'm running standard bars so that makes a bit of a difference and I'm using it purely for training so I probably won't even ride it at the World Championships."

Both Anna Meares and Emily Rosemund missed the event, preferring to concentrate on the sprint, given the time trial's non-Olympic status. McCulloch said that while it would have been nice to have had the other girls compete, her focus was on the Manchester World Cup event in a fortnight.

"With the timed events I never really think about who I'm up against opponent-wise. This is about me going out there and doing the best time that I can. I was two tenths off my PB today so I'm around the money. I've been really wanting to crack the 34 second mark but I think for me that that's a prospect post-London [Olympics]."

McCulloch's next priority at these Australian Championships is the sprint which will conclude on Friday. McCulloch has qualified second fastest, with a time of 11.431, behind Meares, who set 11.088. She is confident she can top the Beijing Olympic silver medallist.

"I think I'm riding into my legs this meet. I've been working a lot with my coach Gary West on some tactical strategies and I really think I can go out there and have a good shot at winning the gold medal this week."

In other events, Josephine Tomic (26 points) made it two gold medals in two nights after she took the 25km points race from Melissa Hoskins (24) and Amy Cure (20).

In the women's under 19 points race a restart was called after ten laps due to a crash on the back straight which caused three riders to fall, including Western Australia's Jessica Allen who suffered track burn on her left quad.

"That's bike racing," she explained after the race. "You can't go out there and think about bad things, you've got to focus on the positives and just move forward."

In a spirited move, Allen decided to take on the field with 40 laps remaining, with Queenslander Allison Rice. Allen took the five points but Rice couldn't hold her wheel, with the Western Australian forging on her own until she finally caught the bunch with four laps to go to take a firm grip of the gold medal with 36 points.

"The atmosphere was just amazing. With 28 laps to go I wasn't sure if I could stay out there but every lap the West Aussies were cheering me on. Finally they gave in and I got the lap. I was just over the moon."

Taylah Jennings who also came to grief in the crash won silver with 24 points and Georgia Baker took bronze with 10 points.

Victoria's Adele Sylvester took gold the women's under 19's 500m time trial, posting a 36.014 despite a slightly wayward first lap. Sylvester edged out Queensland's Taylah Jennings 36.242 and South Australia's Rikki Belder 36.950.

In the men's under 19 1000m time trial, it was one-two for Victoria with Rick Sanders winning in a time of 1:04.653, two tenths of a second ahead of Jaron Gardiner, who set a time of 1:04.741, while New South Welshman Timothy McMillan took the bronze.