Kris Hedges can expect to be a `marked man' this weekend when he and the rest of the Bermuda team take part in the Caribbean Cycling Championships.

That's the view of Bermuda's national cycling coach Greg Hopkins who revealed his riders have a plan to counter that problem when they take to the roads of Curacao on Saturday and Sunday.

Hedges, who rides for the Snow Valley team in the US and won the time trial gold in Aruba last year, is the Island's number one rider and as such he is usually the one the rest of the team work for.

But with other accomplished riders on the roster such as the US-based Geri Mewett and Wayne Scott backed up by Bermuda-based Karl Outerbridge and Kent Richardson, Hopkins hinted there may be a change in the offing.

"Kris obviously, particularly if he wins the time trial this year as convincingly as he did last year, will be a marked man again," said Hopkins. "If that is so it is not necessarily the case that the riders will be riding for Kris as a designated rider. That is something that Kris and I have spoken about at length over the past week or so.

"We have to look at the way the guys are feeling when they actually get down there. They will sit down, have a meeting and formulate the plan there but it is not a foregone conclusion that Kris will be the designated rider this year - that's all I can say on that."

Hopkins said as the team were not now going to the CAC Games in El Salvador next month (see separate story this page) they would be looking to go out on a high in the Caribbean.

"With the way Kris rode in the Commonwealth Games and the way he rode here (winning the event at the CD&P Grand Prix) we are really hoping that he can repeat and get a gold again," he said. "Kent last year I think finished sixth overall and he has been riding exceptionally strongly. Since he has stopped doing triathlon-specific training he has been feeling a lot stronger on the bike."

However, in reference to Richardson's faux pas at the Bank of Bermuda Team Triathlon where while in the lead he lost count and completed an extra lap, Hopkins said: "We will have to make he does the right number this time.

"Aside from that, the reports I received were that he was absolutely flying so it all bodes well for those two in the time trial."

On the road race front, the team will be looking for a little better luck than they had last year.

"Last year we were very unlucky in the early stages of the race because we lost Steve Millington to a crash that took his bike completely out of the race and then a couple of laps later we lost Kent to the same sort of thing," said Hopkins. "It was quite a wild race early on.

"Geri then got himself into a two-man breakaway with a Jamaican and while it was worth a try, in the end it did not work out and it sort of left Kris somewhat unprotected apart from having Wayne with him."

This year he said there was a definite race plan.

"We know who the strong countries are, who the riders are," he said. "Trinidad are an addition this year and they are a very a strong country who we will not be under estimating but it's looking very positive for the men."

On the female front, Melanie Claude and Julia Hawley will find themselves pitched in against their male counterparts as race organisers look to make their race as competitive as possible.

"One thing we discussed with the organisers of the road race was that if the field is extremely small then they are going to start the women with the men," Hopkins said. "They will be doing a shorter distance, obviously, but it is definitely going to effect the way the women will race because they will work off the men.

"It is a very unusual thing to do but the organisers, and we agree, want to try and build on the women's Caribbean Championship race. Last year there were no women's events. We really are trying to push it, to build it, and you have to start somewhere.

"There is no point in having a 50-mile race with eight or nine women. But if those women race with the men at least it's a start."