revision range required for git-svn problem with 1.7.3.1

I asked about this on the IRC channel the other day and was advised to submit 
a bug report to the mailing list.  My problem is this with our internal repo

$ svn co svn+ssh://svn@devel.sharcnet.ca/data/svn/sharcware

works as you would expect

$ git svn clone svn+ssh://svn@devel.sharcnet.ca/data/svn/sharcware
Initialized empty Git repository in .git/

checks out nothing.  However, if I do

$ svn log svn+ssh://svn@devel.sharcnet.ca/data/svn/sharcware -r HEAD
------------------------------------------------------------------------
r1576 | network | 2010-10-19 13:39:29 -0400 (Tue, 19 Oct 2010) | 1 line

Automated network config update.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

$ git svn clone svn+ssh://svn@devel.sharcnet.ca/data/svn/sharcware -r 1:r1576
...<whole bunch of cloning output removed>...

then I get everything as I should.  I would then think this should also work

$ git svn clone svn+ssh://svn@devel.sharcnet.ca/data/svn/sharcware -r 1:HEAD
Initialized empty Git repository in .git/

but it does not.

Thanks!  -Tyson

PS:  The repo is not organized according to the standard format at all.  It is 
just a single trunk rooted at /data/svn/sharcware.