Branwen Smith-King will be the chef de mission for Bermuda’s team at the Pan American Games in Lima, Peru.

Smith-King has the been executive director of the Bermuda Sloop Foundation since 2017. She oversees all aspects of the foundation’s programme and its mission to provide sail training for Bermuda’s youth on Spirit of Bermuda.

Smith-King joined the Sloop Foundation after a 35-year career in athletics, including working at Tufts University in Massachusetts, where she served as head women’s track and field/cross-country coach and assistant director of athletics.

She has also held several NCAA committee sport leadership positions.

Smith-King competed for Bermuda in athletics at Pan Am Games, Commonwealth Games and the Carifta Games, including the first Carifta in Barbados in 1972, where she won a gold medal in the shot put.

Her winning throw was 9.75 metres and Bermuda’s first medal at Carifta.

She later attended Springfield College in Massachusetts and Louisiana State University for undergraduate and graduate studies. The Pan Am Games are the world’s third largest international sporting festival, surpassed only by the Olympics and the Asian Games.

The Games will run from July 26 to August 11, and will involve 7,000 athletes from 41 nations competing in more than 400 events across 39 sports. The Bermuda Olympic Association will name the island’s team in June.