SANTO DOMINGO - Though his expression might not have relayed the fact, Kris Hedges was pleased with his seventh place finish in yesterday's Pan-Am cycling time trial.

He should be, especially after sleeping through his alarm and then, once there, making it onto the starting ramp with just seconds to spare after failing to hear his name called out.

Hedges, who was competing alongside team-mate Geri Mewett in the event close to the seafront in Santo Domingo, clocked one hour, seven minutes and 11 seconds for the 50 kilometre course.

Mewett, who gave everything but could not maintain the same pace, finished 18th out of the 19 starters in 1:13.34.

Jose Serpa, of Colombia took the gold in 1:04.45. Silver went to Chris Baldwin of the USA in 1:05.24 and bronze to Paul Chacon of Venezuela in 1:05.40.

"I am not ecstatic, but definitely relieved and happy to get the first one out of the way and have a decent ride," Hedges said in reference to this weekend's road race.

"Looking at the results, there wasn't much between me and sixth. That was the Brazilian rider (Marcio May) from the World Bs.

"I was aiming for top ten, and, if I had a great ride, I could possibly be top five. But I'm definitely pleased, I was less than two minutes behind Baldwin and that's pretty good."

Hedges believed his time could have been a little better if the day had started as planned.

"There's a lot of chaos around here," he said. "I was a little sluggish getting going today. We slept through our alarm by 45 minutes and we were lucky to make it here when we did.

"Then we had to go and get our bikes checked and pump up our tyres . . . I definitely lost five seconds off the start and that might have come back to hurt me in the end."

The course, which consisted of relatively kind gradients and for the most part was well surfaced, was to Hedges' liking despite the putrid refuse that was scattered liberally on the roadside and the stray dogs and people that were prone to wandering out into the middle of the road.

"I thought it was pretty good," he said. "I don't know if we needed to go that extra 10 kilometres. It would have been a nice 40 kilometre course. I don't think it added much doing that extra 10K, especially in this kind of heat at this time of day.

"But then again maybe that was to my advantage. I haven't seen the split times but they will be interesting to see. I felt like I had a good closing 10 kilometres and I definitely was focused on that. It meant that I didn't fall apart, which was good, because there's a real possibility of that in this heat."

Hedges said he had believed from start that there wouldn't be too much between the best riders - he was 2:26 behind the winner but only a minute behind the bronze medallist.

"I knew it was going to be close," he said. "I knew the leader and second would be a good margin ahead but then, looking at the results, the next four or five places are stacked in there and then it tails off from tenth onwards.

"It's hard when you are out there to remain focused on the fact that after an hour and seven minutes a few seconds are actually going to matter. But that's what it's all about."

Mewett, meanwhile, was definitely not happy with his placing, with only Charles Fabian of Antigua behind him, but he was happy with the effort he put in.

"I'm a little disappointed," he said. "But I didn't save anything out there.

"In the last half a lap my leg went to sleep completely which was very strange. But as far as the ride goes, it was good for next week (road race).

"My average heart rate for the whole thing was like 192, so it's not like I had a whole lot of extra beats left in there."

Bermuda's swimmers saw their first Pan-Am Games action yesterday.

Ronald Cowen and Kiera Aitken took part in the men's 200 metres freestyle and the women's 100 metres freestyle, respectively.

Cowen finished in 1:55.48, outside the Olympic qualifying time for the event by four tenths of a second. He finished 12th overall.

Aitken, meanwhile, finished 22nd overall in a time of 1:00.69.

There is no action for any of Bermuda's competitors today.