Bermuda's Olympic party started with a pop and ended with a fizzle.

Swimmer Kiera Aitken must have inspired her team-mates as she began proceedings with yet another outstanding performance, the kind of which she seems able to produce at every world event.

At 24, she's still breaking records and she did it again at Beijing's acclaimed Water Cube, lowering her old 100 metres backstroke national mark by an amazing one and a half seconds.

Like good wine she continues to get better with age and, given her boundless enthusiasm for the sport, nobody should rule her out of setting more records when the next Games roll around in four years time.

But while she'll return to her training base in Barcelona contented, the rest of the Island's six-strong contingent will no doubt reflect on whether the inevitable pressure of competing in the Olympics ultimately took its toll.

And with that experience under their belt, they'll honestly believe that in London in 2012 it'll be a different story.

None advanced from their heats – that in itself was an unrealistic target. Even Kiera at her very best didn't come close, although long jumper Tyrone Smith fell just three centimetres short on a day when many of his rivals also struggled.

His long jump team-mate Arantxa King rounded out Bermuda's competition on Tuesday, putting herself in a position where she was left with a make-or-break final leap to give herself any chance of qualifying for the final.

When the official's red flag was raised it not only ended her Games but signified the conclusion of Bermuda's campaign.

Inbetween King and Kiera, there was a mixture of 'ifs, buts and maybe's'.

Besides Aitken's swim, the highlight was undoubtedly 37-year-old Jill Teceira's showing in the first qualifying round of the showjumping event in Hong Kong.

On her Games debut, Terceira steered her stallion, Chaka III, to a near-perfect round, amassing just four penalty points after clearing all but one of the 15 fences, and was penalised another point for exceeding the time limit.

Those five points put her on a par with the current world champion and raised hopes that in the second qualifier two days' later she could remain in the top 50 of 77 and advance to a third qualifier from which the medallists would emerge.

But it wasn't to be. Two refusals in the second round undid all of the earlier good work, and Terceira was eliminated.

A day later, Bermuda's triathlon golden girl, Flora Duffy, suffered the same fate.

She too was eliminated two thirds of the way into the event, pulled off the course by officials after suffering the same kind of race-day form that has dogged her young career for several months.

Swimmer Roy Allen Burch didn't show the outward emotions that left Duffy in tears, but inside he, too, will have been angry and frustrated.

He went into his 100 metres freestyle heat with the fastest time of any of his six rivals. He climbed out of the pool in fifth place, having failed to remotely threaten his own national record.

Chef de Mission Phil Guishard said Bermuda Olympic Association had had 'no qualms" about the team they had selected.

They were, he said, chosen on merit, gave their best and fully deserved the Olympic experience.

It was no doubt an experience they'll all treasure.

Some 11,000 athletes from 205 countries will take away the same memories.

But of those, only a small percentage will return home with a medal around their neck.