AFTER today's lavish Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Olympics in which show jumper Jill Terceira will carry the island's flag, Bermuda's athletes will put their game faces on for what it is all about ¿ competing against the best athletes in the world.

And getting the show off for Bermuda will be swimmer Kiera Aitken who will compete in the opening heats of the 100 metres backstroke on Sunday.

Aitken is also the only Bermuda athlete in China who has been to an Olympics before ¿ she competed four years ago in Athens and had a fantastic performance when she won her heat and also smashed her own national record by half a second. However she failed to make the final.

Leading up to these Games Aitken, who has been living and competing in Barcelona, Spain for the past two years, has been in excellent form.

In April she recorded two new national records at the Spanish Nationals in Mallorca.

She posted personal best times and new records in the 100 and 200 metres backstroke. In the 200 metres event she clocked a time of 2:21.08 and in her specialty, the 100 metres backstroke, she recorded a time of 1:04.16.

Manager of the two swimmers in Beijing, (Aitken and Roy Allen Burch who will compete in the 100 metres freestyle) is Aitken's mother Mary Beth and this week she told the Mid-Ocean News: "We have had some training sessions (in the Olympic pool) and that has gone very well. Both Kiera and Roy are very impressed with the facilities ¿ it really is a gorgeous facility, absolutely wonderful.

"In fact everything here is first class . . . except the pollution. I have never seen anything like it ¿ I don't think I have seen the sky yet! Right now I am standing looking out my window (in the Olympic Village) and I can see the pollution ¿ it is very bad and very obvious. It looks like fog but you know it is pollution."

Pollution or not, Aitken said the athletes are in great spirits ahead of the Opening Ceremony and their events.

"Everyone is in high spirits. While Kiera is the only Bermuda athlete here who has been to an Olympics before, it is the first time for everyone else and they are all excited ¿ in very high spirits. They are all enjoying the atmosphere. The organisation has been very good and everyone is very friendly and helpful."

Besides the two swimmers, Bermuda will have two track athletes ¿ Arantxa King in the long jump and Tyrone Smith, also in the long jump ¿ triathlete Flora Duffy and show jumper Jill Terceira who will be based in Hong Kong.

Of the Olympic Village, Aitken said: "The Village is wonderful. It is very beautiful and the rooms are excellent. The food is from all around the world. You have everything from sushi to curry. I will have to watch that I don't gain weight!"

This is one of Bermuda's smallest Olympic teams but Chef de Mission Philip Guishard said: "Any representation in this world event for an island of our size is laudable."

With Olympic qualifying standards constantly rising it is becoming harder and harder for small countries like Bermuda to send athletes to the Games, said Bermuda national swimming coach Richard Goodwin.

"Just look at the last three months ¿ there have been 52 world records set in swimming. And while that is great for the progress of the sport it can be daunting for smaller countries like Bermuda. It is hard for our (small pool) of athletes to keep up."

Bermuda Olympic Association chief John Hoskins, who left for Beijing on Tuesday, agreed with Goodwin saying: "It is getting more and more difficult to qualify because the standards are going up all of the time. We are just too small. Even our sailors are going to find it difficult to qualify in the future."

Noting that the average size of an Olympic fleet was under 20 boats, Hoskins said: "A lot of big countries have a lot of people (to choose from) in every class and you probably have 10 countries who are automatics. It is getting more and more difficult to qualify in all of the sports."

Hoskins, who has been a Bermuda Olympic Association official at every Games (except Moscow) since the Munich Games in 1972, said that while Bermuda athletes have a better chance at the Pan Am and Commonwealth Games, it was reaching the Olympics which was every athlete's dream.

"Every athlete wants to go to the Olympics and you always have to keep that in your sights. But it is so difficult to qualify never mind win medals. Our gene pool is not big enough.

"If you are going to get to the Olympics you obviously have to be (training and competing) abroad although of course our sailors can train here all year round but they have to compete abroad."

Asked how he thought China would fare as hosts, Hoskins said: "I think China will do a good job overall. While Athens (2004) had problems finishing all the work, China is completely different. Everything is going to be in place but of course there is the weather (pollution). Athens was a bit of a polluted city but of course nothing compared to Beijing.

"Unfortunately everyone always tries to knock them ¿ ever since China were awarded the Games. People have made every excuse to not to like them hosting the Games but I think they will do a good job. I think it will be a very good Games."

Terceira arrived with her mount Chaka in Hong Kong this week and said: "All is well ¿ except there was a typhoon that Hong Kong when I arrived. Mostly it was high winds and rain. But the rain cooled the temperatures so that will help the horses cope. Chaka is doing fine and the facilities at the equestrian park are very well organised ¿ the stable area is of the highest standard!"

Heidi Mello, the Equestrian Deputy Chef de Mission, said the facility is first class. "Everything is climate controlled including the training facilities. This is the first time China has held the olympics and I do not expect them to cut any corners."

Mello, who has been designing courses internationally for years, also helped train the local stewards at the equestrian venue which is the Hong Kong Jockey Club.

"I expect the event will be run very well ¿ the Chinese are very thorough.

"I think we can we are lucky to be here in Hong Kong because we can just concentrate on our sport. As you know horse people are a breed of their own anyway."

But Mello said herself and Terceira will be getting a taste of the Olympics in Beijing as they will be flying over for the Opening Ceremony.

"Jill and I are going to be flown up to Beijing the morning of the ceremony (today) and we will put on our red skirts and blazers and go to the Opening Ceremony. We are flying up on a charter flight with all the other equestrians and then we will stay in a hotel and come back the next day (Saturday). So we will get the feeling at being at the Olympics in Beijing."

Mello also had words of praise for Patrick Nisbett who also qualified for the show jumping for these Olympics along with Terceira although only one could go. Nisbett was chosen by the Bermuda Equestrian Federation but pulled out at the last minute as he believed his horse was not physically ready.

"To me it didn't matter whether it was Jill or Patrick who was going," she said. "This is the first time we have had representation in show jumping at the Olympics ¿ this was not given to us as a wild card. We earned this spot.

"I would like Patrick to be thanked for fantastic sportsmanship. He could have kept his mouth closed and he could have waited until quarantine day to give his mare the last second of a chance to see if she was going to be alright and if he had done that we wouldn't have had a rider going at all. I have always thought of Patrick as a great horseman but he went up in my estimation when he put the horse first. The Olympic Games will always be there but his horse comes first. I really congratulate Patrick for looking after his horse first and for also looking out for the well being of the federation and giving Jill the opportunity to ride. We have a good team ¿ we will all put our efforts together."

This first week of the Olympics will see only the two swimmers compete with Duffy, Smith, King and Terceira competing in the second week.

Roy Allen Burch will follow Aitken into the pool when he competes in his 100 metres freestyle heat on Tuesday.

And while he will be doing his best to advance, Burch ¿ a Springfield College student ¿ told American journalist Ron Chimelis that the London Olympics in 2012 will probably be where he swims his best.

He said he is also looking ahead to the 2011 world championships in Shanghai, so he hopes the Beijing Games will be his first of two trips to China.

By the 2012 Olympics, he will be 26.

His coach John Taffe at Springfield said that 26 is no longer old in swimming. "In our sport, people are hanging around longer, and doing much better in their mid-20s," Taffe said.

Burch is hoping to get to the semi-finals of his event in Beijing ¿ something no Bermuda swimmer has ever done.

"His events are determined by (fractions) of a second, though, so you never know," said Taffe, who has coached the Pride at Springfield for 19 years, and calls Burch one of the school's all-time best swimmers.

"The environment (in Beijing) will bring out the best in him, I'm sure of that," Taffe said.

Burch has competed at three NCAA championships and has broke six school records in freestyle and backstroke events. In Bermuda, he set a national record in the 100 free, and broke his own mark in the 50 free.