Bermuda won a first CAC Games medal for 12 years in Colombia this month ? but chef de mission Kris Hedges admitted yesterday that results across the board did not make pleasant reading.

While the four-man squash team of Nick Kyme, James Stout, Michael Shrubb and Mel Caines returned home last week with bronze medals hanging around their necks, none of the other athletes in cycling, hockey, diving and athletics came remotely close to a place on the podium.

Cyclist Geri Mewett placed 41st out of 63 riders in the160 kilometre road race, diver Katura Horton-Perinchief finished eighth in both the one- metre and three-metre springboard and the only two track athletes sent to South America ? Akila King and Michael Donawa ? failed to make it out of their heats in the 200 and 800 metres respectively.

Meanwhile, in the Dominican Republic, the women?s hockey team avoided the wooden spoon in the eight-team competition by beating the hosts 2-0 in their final play-off match, captain Megan Spurling and Maryellen Jackson notching Bermuda?s goals.

The situation wasn?t helped, Hedges said, by the fact that many of Bermuda?s top athletes were not present, adding that the CACs were a Games at which Bermuda could be ?extremely competitive? if they were taken seriously.

?The team we sent down was very small and I think the results reflected that to a certain extent,? Hedges said.

?Saying that, it?s been a number of years since we last won a medal and as far as the squash team are concerned, that was a huge accomplishment.

?The fact that it came in a team event as well made it even better and something that Bermuda should be extremely pleased with and proud about.

?But there were quite a large number of sports in which we were not represented at all ? and where we were represented we sometimes had only one or two athletes involved such as track.

?It put it into perspective ? for me anyway ? when I got down here and saw that a country the size of the US Virgin Islands had 150-odd athletes competing across the board.

?To bring that number of athletes here ? particularly given their size ? was extremely impressive and something I think Bermuda should be aspiring towards.

?I know there was the Commonwealth Games this year and the CAC?s are always likely to lose out if that happens. And I know as well that a lot of our top athletes have their own agendas and goals which might not involve representing Bermuda at Games such as the CACs.

?But it is definitely a Games at which we could do a lot better if we were a little more committed to it.?