talents which earned them their first overseas meet triumph four weeks ago.

The Bermuda Triangle Challenge, which opens at the Southampton Princess Hotel tonight and runs through Sunday, will also present the girls with a chance to meet the standards to qualify for this summer's Pan American Games.

The opposition, comprising seven American teams bringing more than 80 gymnasts, will be tough, conceded Bermuda coach Walid Mustafa.

But he he felt his youngsters, boosted with confidence by their triumph at the Gym-Beez Invitational in Pennsylvania early this month, would do themselves proud.

"For about the first week after they won the Gym-Beez, their heads were a little bit big,'' said Mustafa.

"But now I think they're a bit nervous, because they feel people are expecting a lot of them.

"I'm hoping we will hold our own, but for us the most important thing is to hit our own personal goals. That is how we will guage ourselves, rather than how we do against the opposition.'' Mustafa said the girls had been working hard to prepare themselves for the biggest event on the Island's gymnastics calendar and had trained on 10 successive days at their east-end base, Toad's Gym.

The six girls who won the Gym-Beez with a solid team performance -- Maria Darby, Christina White, Leila Wadson, Alex Froncioni, Sasha Christensen and Shauntiah Rawlins -- will all be performing and will be joined in the team by Rowan Hallett and LaToya Brunson.

Mustafa said Wadson was suffering a slight wrist injury but would still compete and added: "In this sport a team will always have aches and pains -- you're always icing or patching up something -- but I'd say we're the healthiest we've been in the last three years.'' Brunson, 12, is returning on the back of just four weeks' training, having been unable to train for the past year-and-a-half.

Tonight, level nine and 10 competition opens at 7.45 and tomorrow morning the level eight gymnasts are in action from 10 a.m.

Some 15 local girls aged between six and 10, in the recreational option class, will make their debut in competitive gymnastics tomorrow afternoon from 2.45.

Mustafa said: "Some of those little ones are very exciting. They've been working very hard and they know when it's time to play and when it's time to concentrate.

"It will be a chance to see which kids take to competition and which don't.

In our seniors, for example, Sasha Christensen is an ice-cold competitor.'' The third Triangle Challenge will wind up on Sunday morning, with the last phase of competition starting at 10.15 a.m.

Entries have dropped this year, but Mustafa said that was partly due to a mix-up with an airline offering discounted fares for those competing.

"We had negotiated a special price of $250, but gyms were ringing up and being told $500 so I think it put some of them off,'' said Mustafa, declining to name the airline involved.

More than 100 overseas gymnasts competed last year, but this year the Triangle has had to compete with five major meets being held this weekend on the US east coast.

A good attendance is expected over the three days and admission at the door will cost $5, or $10 for a weekend pass.