Elite cyclist Kaden Hopkins runs the risk of failing to make the Caribbean Championships in Guyana this weekend.

Hopkins is the latest Bermudian to fall foul of airport staff not understanding that holders of Bermuda passports are exempt from requiring Esta visas to travel to the United States, with staff at AirEuropa, the third-largest airline in Spain, refusing to let him board a flight from Alicante to Miami via Madrid.

The rider, who produced documents at the desk detailing the travel and visa arrangements, was turned away with the company refusing to book him another flight as they claimed it was “his fault” for not having a valid visa to the US.

“This is the first time I have ever flown with an airline that couldn’t sort out the problem,” Hopkins said.

“I got to the airport and got to check-in and they told me I needed an Esta and I was trying to explain that I didn’t. I pulled up all of the documents that said we don’t need them and the official US immigration office document, but they said they could not bypass the system.

“When they tried to put it in manually, at the end of the manual entry it asked them to scan the Bermuda passport and when they scanned it, it reverted to the British country code and they couldn’t bypass it in the system, so I couldn’t get a boarding pass.

“They said it was my fault for not having the right documentation and they told me I had to buy another flight as it wasn’t their fault that I wasn’t flying.”

Hopkins now has to pay more than $2,000 to book flights to Guyana, which reduces his preparation for the Caribbean Championships Time-Trial to less than a few hours. He has booked the replacement flights for Thursday on his British passport, applying for an Esta, which he hopes will be approved within 24 hours.

The delay has infuriated Hopkins, with the Caribbean Championships his last major event of the season and he now runs the risk of not being able to compete if there are any delays/hitches.

“It’s been such a stressful morning and my preparation for the Caribbean Championships is now far from ideal,” he said.

“I was going to be fighting jet lag anyway even arriving on Thursday, but getting to Guyana on Friday evening, with the time-trial starting at 8am on Saturday takes the jet lag to a whole new level.

“After long travel, it’s always ideal to get one or two rides in before you compete to flush the travel out of your legs and open yourself up a bit. If all my replacement flights go as scheduled, I may be able to fit in an hour in the evening beforehand.

“If one of my other flights get cancelled or delayed and I don’t make a connection or my bikes don’t get transferred through, there is no time to get things fixed. When I get to Madrid, I will 100 per cent make sure that my bikes are transferred before I get on the plane. I cannot afford any delay or problem if I am going to compete and it’s a huge pain.”

Hopkins, who has picked up two gold medals at previous Caribbean Championships, as hoping to add some more hardware to his collection but his preparations have now been severely affected.

“My off-season starts on Monday as soon as I finish the Caribbean Championships,” Hopkins said.

“If we didn’t have Caribbean Championships, I would have started my off-season after the World Championships. I’ve stayed on the bike for another month just for this event and done a lot of long, hard training for it.

“For this to happen at the lat minute is just so stressful and having done a lot of travel, I’ve learnt that you can’t stress about things that you can’t control, but I have to say that was tested here. For the first hour, I wasn’t too stressed but by the end I was almost losing it, but I tried to stay as calm as I could