Sulzberger took the frontrunning with victory in the first leg of the $120,000 four-race series, the Tour of Gippsland.

He heads the points chase from West Australia, with South Australian Tim Roe third.

Sixth-placed Dylan Newell is the highest placed Victorian.

The 24-year-old Sulzberger is aiming to complete a family double in the series.

His younger brother Wes won the 2006 Scody Cup.

Bernard, fresh from racing a criterium series in the United States, rang Wes in Italy before clinching the Tour of Gippsland with a show of sprinting power in the closing criterium stage.

"He gave me a bit of a pep talk," Bernard confided.

"I hope I can take my Gippsland form into Ballarat as I would like to emulate Wes and win the Scody Cup.

"There's a lot of prestige attached to winning the Scody Cup," he said.

The Scody Cup, founded in 1996 as the Tattersall's Cup, is Australia's premier domestic road cycling competition.

It comprises the Tour of Gippsland, Australian Cycling Grand Prix, Tour of the Murray River on August 31- September 7 and the Tour of Tasmania on September 30 - October 5.

The Ballarat-based Australian Cycling Grand Prix incorporates the Victorian open men's and women's road championships and begins with time trials at Learmonth on Friday.

Criteriums will be contested on a Sturt St circuit on Saturday and races on the Australian Open Road Cycling Championships course at Buninyong on Sunday.

Scody Cup points leaders: Bernard Sulzberger (Tasmania) 61, Benjamin King (Western Australia) 50, Timothy Roe (South Australia) 50,

Nathan Clarke (Tasmania) 48, Daniel Furmston (Tasmania) 48, Dylan Newell (Victoria) 43, Peter Milostic (New South Wales) 40, Cameron Hughes (Queensland) 38, Leigh Howard (Victoria) 36, Chris Luxton (SA) 33, Travis Meyer

(WA), Pip Grinter (Victoria) 28, David Kemp (Queensland) 24, Michael England (Queensland) 23.