PUNTO FIJO, Venezuela -- The husband and wife sailing team of Brett and Sara Lane Wright gave Bermuda's CAC Games challenge a boost with fine performances in the opening races of the yachting competition.

With the Island failing to get even a sniff of a medal in any of the events so far, both moved into the silver position after the first two races of the 12-race series in their respective Laser and Laser Radial classes.

Both slipped back slightly on Saturday, although Sara Lane was third after the second day of sailing, maintaining a place among the leaders. Brett was also still in touch in fifth place in a fleet of 17 dinghies.

Sara Lane finished third and second in her two races on Friday to give her five points and put her just one point behind Cuba's Marisela Duarte Sanchez.

Duarte Sanchez maintained her lead after Saturday's competition, four points ahead of Wright, who had accumulated 12. Mexico's Eliane Fierro was second with 11 points.

Brett was on 24 points -- 19 points behind Laser leader Osvaldo Padron, also of Cuba -- after the second day of racing, a disappointment after finishing third and second on the first day.

But with individual race placings not made available to reporters in the Games Centre in Maracaibo, it was unclear whether Wright's fall was due just to one bad race. If so, his position might be better than it appears with competitors allowed to drop their worst race at the end of competition.

Organisers also failed to provide any information on the conditions competitors were facing. Other classes racing in the event include Hobie Cat, Sunfish and Mistral.

CYCLING MacIinnis Looby and Kris Hedges finished in a huge pack of riders just two minutes behind the medallists in a tight individual CAC Games road race yesterday.

Looby and Hedges were both recorded as finishing in four hours, one minute and 17 seconds -- Looby being credited with 34th place and Hedges 37th in the field of 61 riders.

Mike Lee, in his first and only outing of the CAC Games, came in a further three minutes and 22 seconds behind to claim 45th spot. Jason Krupp, also competing for the first time since arriving over a week ago, was forced to retire, although it wasn't clear last night why.

So close was the race, contested over a distance of 161.5 kilometres, that gold, silver and bronze winners Pedro Marquez of Cuba, and Mexicans Manuel Glass and Irving Robles, shared the same time of 3:59.12 after a sprint finish.

GYMNASTICS Bermuda's gymnastics team's warm-up for the Commonwealth Games began in the stultifying atmosphere of La Victoria complex in Maracaibo on Saturday with their two weakest events -- the vault and assymetric bars.

Medals were not the priority as the team of Leila Wadson, Christina White, Sasha Christensen and Laura Murphy competed for the first time in two months.

However, the top 18 girls in the team event proceed to the all-round finals.

Murphy, 16, was awarded the best mark of the quartet on the vault, gaining a 7.85. Wadson scored 7.212 with the best of her two attempts, while Christensen was awarded 6.775.

White, who missed the high-profile Bermuda Triangle Challenge at the Southampton Princess in February with a knee injury suffered on the eve of the event, recorded a 7.375.

But she struggled a little on the assymetric bars, scoring low in the threes after having to stop twice. Murphy, who had to have the front bar lifted to allow for her five foot five height, achieved 6.100 in the discipline, while Wadson was marked at 4.8.