June 29, 2004 – Due to a recent letter sent out by the founder of the 24 Hours of Adrenalin (President and Owner of the now bankrupt Trilife Inc.), the OCA felt that it was necessary to respond. This news release was circulated to the public last week and put the OCA, amongst others, in a bad light. Jim Crosscombe, the OCA President, felt that it was necessary to respond in order to put the record straight.

Dear Stuart,
I am writing this as an open letter to you. I will also be circulating it to our members and our media partners. It is unfortunate that you chose a public forum to air your dirty laundry, as the facts do not support your allegations. I can only hope that you do not find yourself embroiled in further litigation.

I would like to take this opportunity to disagree with a number of your statements that you have made regarding the OCA in your latest information release to the public. I take note of the fact that it was not directly distributed to me and I only found out about it after a copy was forwarded to me. I trust that my setting the record straight will not affect future business with your firm.

I have known you since the beginning of the story and have gone out of my way as the President of the OCA to ensure that you were treated as a primary customer of the OCA should be, in other words as a valued partner in cycling. I can honestly say that I felt nothing but respect for the growth of Trilife over the years and I can also say that I have never let my personal thoughts about you or Trilife enter into our business dealings. I prefer not to dwell on this but if you are in doubt about what personal business I am referring to feel free to call me or alternatively I can elaborate in a public forum. I will do that only as an individual and not as a spokesperson for the OCA.

The first point I would like to correct is that we did not approach you to take over the O-Cup series, that is unless preliminary discussions count as a commitment. We held these discussions with many prospective organizers as a way of testing the waters. In the end we selected Chico racing, one of your competitors who had extensive experience in holding competitive races. The obstacles that we allegedly put in your way are hardly as onerous as you describe in your release. If you call sifting through the fog regarding your bankruptcy and determining the future of the event “becoming difficult”, then perhaps you would like to review with me the process to help me understand where the obstacles lay. I don’t think even your customers and sponsors understand who they are actually dealing with as a result of the fog surrounding the bankruptcy. Full disclosure was never forthcoming.

I have to remind you that we tread very carefully in dealing with you because we had hired a former business partner of yours, so I alone dealt with correspondence to your firm. Notwithstanding these precautions you continued to harass this individual with letters from your lawyer by sending them to his place of employment, despite having no relevance to his job at the OCA. I should point out that you failed to mention in your release that your former partner, our current executive director is a creditor as a result of your bankruptcy. It would be understandable if he slipped once and had a bad word or two to say about your actions towards him regardless of whom he was employed by. Your suggestion that this is a major breach of trust is somewhat bizarre because I went out of my way to deal with you in a professional manner. A courtesy that was not always readily apparent in your actions towards the OCA, staff, fellow organizers and our members.

Before I identify the roadblocks that you claim were put in the path of your event there are a couple of observations that I would like to make. It would appear that both Hardwood Hills and the OCA were paid for outstanding 2003 fees immediately prior to your declared bankruptcy. I was not aware of this till well after the fact and I can only surmise that your strategy was to retain a positive tie to the organizations that you needed to do business with down the road. I thank you for your payment but by accepting it I appear to have helped you circumvent the bankruptcy trustee and other creditors. The other point is that nowhere in the long discussion over how much you were willing to pay us did you mention the bankruptcy to me. This is how you as ” the OCA’s best customer over the years” and as a “long-standing, loyal customer” chose to conduct business with the leader of the organization that helped facilitate your annual event. Is it any wonder there would be no more “special deals for Trilife” or should I say 24 Sports Inc, one of a myriad of companies you appear to have now incorporated to protect your assets.

I will set the record straight by including key points from my letter that I sent to you by fax on January 13th 2004. In it I asked you to provide a sanction form and comply with 3 very basic conditions. I have no idea why you found them to be so onerous that you could not comply with my simple request. I even sent an additional letter to you on January 25th by fax that you also chose to ignore. What you failed to include in the news release is any indication as to why you could not comply with these basic conditions.

1)Provide a current letter of permission from the venue
2)A list of the principals in your company
3)A list of authorized signing officers

I can see the problem and I am sure that others can also read volumes from the fact that you chose not to respond. What are you trying to hide from a trusted partner?

To be blunt Stuart it is not the rest of the world that is against you and certainly not the OCA. There is no conspiracy theory; just good business practices being utilized. We have our interests to protect and I have done so in a way that I am sure the 7,500 direct and affiliated members of the OCA would agree with, after all that is my job.

In your release you have blamed virtually everyone for your problems and I wonder if you have ever taken the time to reflect on your actions to date. Your news release suggests otherwise and you continue to defend your behaviour, in my opinion, with a very biased version of the facts. You are the captain of the ship and when you ran it aground last year you began to play a mind game governed by your rules in an attempt to deflect criticism of the situation you found yourself in. As a businessman I would have gone about it quite differently. Accept the fact that you declared bankruptcy for whatever reason, take the flak, stop the foolishness and get on with what you do best; running quality 24 hr events.

In closing I again extend my offer to provide insurance and any other OCA services you may require for your event this year or any other event down the road. However there will be the same reasonable conditions applied that I have outlined in my correspondence to you. I await the opportunity to again do business with you.

Jim Crosscombe
President
Ontario Cycling Association

http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/news1/newslisting.php?id=208

February 3, 2004 – Despite the fact there is only one company now advertising a 24-hour mountain bike race at Hardwood Hills on August 21-22, there are still plenty of question marks surrounding the event. Hardwood Hills' officials are maintaining there will now be no event at its facility, located north of Barrie, Ont. But Stuart Dorland, president of twenty4 sports Inc., is confident his recently restructured company will stage an event at Hardwood Hills on Aug. 21-22. Out of the picture now is Chico Racing, a company based in Uxbridge, Ont., which jumped at the opportunity to stage the 24 Hour of Harwood Hills, at the end of August, when it appeared there would not be and event staged there this year. Dorland's former company, Trilife Inc., has staged 24 Hour of Adrenalin events throughout North America this past decade. Its flagship Canadian race was an August event at Hardwood Hills. But Trilife's future, and in particular that event, was put in limbo in early December of 2003 when Trilife declared bankruptcy. Shortly thereafter, on Jan. 9, 2004, Chico Racing announced it was staging a 24-hour race at Hardwood Hills on Aug.21-22, as Chico Racing and Hardwood Hills had agreed to a one-year contract to stage an event this August. But several days later the situation became controversial when Dorland sent out a press release stating his old company had restructured and was now called twenty4 sports Inc. The release stated that twenty4 sports had purchased all of Trilife's assets, including all contracts it had for its 24-hour races. Dorland believes he has a legally binding contract to hold an event at Hardwood Hills this August. But Hardwood Hills' general manager Glenn Meeuwisse feels otherwise. The discrepancy centres around whether the contract Trilife had with Hardwood Hills can be transferred to another company. Dorland believes the answer is yes, while Meeuwisse does not share this opinion. The issue could be resolved in the courts as the two parties have only been exchanging lawyers' letters since twenty4 sports was founded. “It is increasingly disappointing that this is continuing to go on,” Dorland said. “I would have thought by now clearer minds would have prevailed.” Meeuwisse is also hoping the matter is soon settled. “I hope it comes to some sort of resolution before the Toronto Bike Show coming this Mar. 5-7, because if it doesn't people are going to be even more confused,” he said. Meeuwisse added that Hardwood Hills has no interest in working with Dorland or his new company this year or at any time in the near future. Meeuwisse said though he had a positive relationship with Dorland and Trilife in the past, things had soured in recent years as riders had voiced some displeasure as to how Trilife was operating its Hardwood Hills races. “I don't want to be associated with anything that has a negative feeling because then it becomes associated with us at Hardwood Hills,” Meeuwisse added. Meeuwisse would have been comfortable working with Chico Racing president Adam Ruppel on an event this year. But Ruppel sent out a news release on Jan. 23 stating Chico Racing had decided to back out from hosting an Aug. 21-22 Hardwood Hills event this year. Ruppel said his decision was based on the potential for a lengthy legal battle with twenty4 sports. “I totally respect his decision,” Meeuwisse said. “I probably would have done the same thing if I was in his shoes.”