Bermuda Olympic Association president Peter Dunne has got his hands dirtier than expected at the Pan American Games in Chile.

Instead of navigating his way through meetings with colleagues at other national Olympic committees and equipment suppliers, Dunne has been changing tyres and bicycle chains after cycling team manager Clifford Roberts was forced to return home.

It was Dunne, also president of the Bermuda Bicycle Association, who oversaw Conor White’s bronze medal in the time-trial on Saturday and, truth be told, he perhaps feels more at home among the athletes than the world of administration.

“A week ago I was doing that in Guadeloupe and it’s something I have been doing for more than a dozen years, so it’s a role I’m comfortable in,” Dunne said.

“Kaden [Hopkins] and Conor are very professional in how they acquit themselves and they know what they need to do so there is no need to micro-manage their day.

“On race day, I’m very lucky that I know how to get things organised for them, but I was mostly thinking about Clifford, who was in the role but had to go home with a medical issue. I know he’s missing this terribly.

“It’s not a difficult pivot. Some of the things my time is occupied with as a BOA president is soft stuff. I’m trying to meet with potential suppliers and meet with other Olympic committees to learn how they run themselves.

“These are soft things and we only had the two cyclists here in that discipline, so it’s not something that is overly difficult for me at the moment.

“It means all day Saturday and Sunday I will be focused on the road race and I’ve had to change things about.”

Dunne has been BOA president for just two years with the Pan Am Games the biggest outside of the Olympics, but it is not only the elite athletes in Santiago, Chile, who are helped by the organisation.

“For many of our athletes this is the pinnacle of their sporting careers so from the organisation standpoint we need to make sure we are providing those athletes with whatever they need to be able to perform,” Dunne added.

“We’re helping them get here and then, when they do get here, they have everything to need to perform at their best.

“If you look at the elite athlete programme that we run, which is funded externally partially by the government, Pan Am Sports and Olympic Solidarity, those are concentrated mainly on the core elite athletes and those are the people you would expect to see in events like this.

“However, we recently did an analysis of the number of sports the BOA is helping through the various mechanisms that we have and the number is in the teens. We’re not just supporting 20 athletes at the high end there are other grants that are visible.

“For example, Bermuda basketball is getting a grant at the moment and that is a multi-year grant to help with development, so we want to be able to do that kind of work as well as support the high end.

“It’s a challenge as the funding available to us from these external sources are finite. We get the same amount of money from Olympic Solidarity as every other country in the Caribbean and pretty much every other country in the world. In some economies that’s a lot of money and in other countries not so much.

“The elite athlete funds that we manage is a fixed amount for the year so we have a methodology for calculating A, B and C athletes. We would love to see more athletes in there but if a fixed number is divided by a bigger number then there is a lower amount per person. It’s a dilemma for us.”

To solve that quandary, Dunne is keen to attract corporate sponsors but faces competition from national governing bodies and grassroots organisations.

“The motivation of the corporate community to support grassroots activity is very strong and that’s a great thing because without that you’re never going to have an elite athlete,” Dunne said.

“Every athlete this year has been involved in a sports programme from a very early age and their progression has allowed them to go further but it all starts at grassroots level. The structure necessitates that and you reach more people that way.

“If I were on a corporate committee for sponsorship I would think there is bang for buck there, but at the same time when we are at a Games like this, which truly is the pinnacle, we need to be identifying potential sponsors, asking how they see themselves engaging with that and we need to have greater corporate support.

“When the athletes come to these Games we need to make sure they feel great. Nobody wants to head to the start line, look to their left, look to their right and feel that you don’t belong and are competing in and with lesser stuff.

“We’re also competing with the national sports bodies as if they want sponsorship for their national championships they need to go and find one. We’re chasing the same people so we have to work through that. We have some new folks on our executive board who will help, but at the end of the day we would like to funnel more to current athletes, expand the pool of elite athletes and then reach out to more of the developmental programmes.”

One of Dunne’s main aims is to raise the profile of the BOA and, by extension, Bermuda’s elite athletes in the hope that the island can get behind stars at the big Games.

“More of what we need to do is raise our profile because the Olympics come around every four years and that’s the biggest sporting event in the world, but there is a lot more going on all the time.

“We’re looking at a minimum of eight different sports festivals with all the youth Games and We haven’t even scratched the surface of Beach Games or possibly Winter Games, so I think we need to raise our profile and makes sure the public sees us as accessible, embracing all athletes and all sports. We need to get the general public involved.

“I’m talking to people from other Olympic committees and finding a way to boost our brand because our brand is really the athletes brand

“They communicate their national pride in their athletes and I think we need to be able to do that across all our sports and individual athletes so they can feel the loving embrace of all 60,000 people in Bermuda.”