DeVon Bean expects to lay some ghosts to rest in Rio — his first Olympic Games since competing in the 100 metres in Atlanta 20 years ago.

Bean has bittersweet memories of the Atlanta Games.

He fulfilled a childhood dream and raced in the same heat as his idol Frankie Fredericks of Namibia, but was severely hampered with a hamstring injury and crashed out in the first round.

Aged just 21, Bean reassured himself he would at least get one more shot at delivering something special at the Olympics.

Unfortunately, it was not to be, with Bean failing to qualify for the 2000 Sydney Games in the long jump — his preferred event — by five centimetres.

“Missing out on Sydney left a really bad taste in my mouth,” Bean said. “Atlanta was meant to be my learning curve.

“Over the years I’ve learnt to let it go, but there’s still an empty feeling in my stomach.

“It’s a bittersweet feeling because I was only able to qualify for one Olympics and I wasn’t at my best.”

Six weeks prior to Atlanta, Bean pulled his hamstring and spent the next few weeks on crutches before receiving round-the-clock treatment to win his race for fitness.

Still, he was not the same athlete and finished seventh in his heat in a time of 10.89sec, far slower than the personal best of 10.27 he had set just months earlier while competing for Long Beach City College in Glendora, California.

“I was way off my best in Atlanta and bummed out in the first round,” Bean said. “I was on crutches for the first few weeks after the injury and could barely walk.

“I didn’t know if I was going to get to Atlanta.

“It was still an amazing experience, though. You had 80,000 people in the stadium and my face was up on the jumbotron.

“I was racing against guys I’d looked up to like Frankie Fredericks and Donavon Bailey. Suddenly my idols had become my enemies!”

Bean, Bermuda’s athletics coach in Rio, is performing the role of “adviser and friend” to sprinter Tre Houston and long jumper Tyrone Smith.

The 40-year-old has a special bond with Houston, who was Bean’s first athlete when he established his Dash athletics team in 2010.

“The consolation for me is knowing that void of disappointment can be filled if Tre does something at the Olympics,” said Bean, who credits Jerry Swan, a former Bermuda coach, and Pacers Track Club coach Cal Simons for shaping his coaching style. “Then I can rest my head at night and let it go.”

Bean’s personal best in the 100 still stands as a national record, although Houston came within one hundredth of a second of breaking it at the Aliann Pompey Invitational Track and Field in Guyana in June.

It would be most fitting, Bean said, if Houston or Kyle Webb, his other sprint protégé, finally shattered his 20-year-old record.

“Three amazing things happened that day [in Glendora]: I broke the school record, broke the national record and qualified for Atlanta,” Bean said. “I didn’t think 10.27 would last this long, but that says a lot about the time.

“Both Tre and Kyle are knocking on the door. Kyle recently ran a wind-assisted 10.31 in Illinois and I would love to see him compete at the next Olympics.

“Do I want the record to stand forever? Sure, but records are there to be broken. If anyone has to break it, I’d like to be one of the two athletes I’ve influenced along the way.”

As a former long jumper, Bean also hopes his knowledge in that event can prove beneficial to Smith, who hopes to challenge for the podium.

“A lot of people know me as a sprinter but I had far more success as a long jumper,” said Bean, a former joint national-record holder with Dennis Trott with a jump of 7.89.

“Long jump was always my main event but for whatever reason in 1996 I was flying [in sprinting]. Long jump was always the goal for Sydney.”

Bean added: “It’s a wonderful experience being coach in Rio and hopefully I can pick up on a lot of things on the other side of the fence.

“I’m providing a service for the athletes. All the hard work is done already. I just need to get in their heads, make them feel confident and be their friend.”

Bean’s duties in Rio will prevent him from taking the stage to defend his “Mr Bermuda” title at this weekend’s Night of Champions at CedarBridge Academy.

However, bodybuilding is merely a recreational hobby for Bean. Athletics is his passion.

“No disrespect to bodybuilding but I still consider it a hobby,” he said.

“Going to Rio and witnessing history and seeing our guys compete, well, it wasn’t even a thought.”

Should Houston achieve his objective of advancing to the semi-finals and Smith force his way onto the podium, then Bean’s Olympic demons will be well and truly exorcised.