Four-time Olympian Peter Bromby is seriously contemplating making a run at the 2012 Olympics in London in his beloved Star class.

The Bermudian returned from the Bacardi Cup in Miami this week and was pleased with how he and American crew Magnus Liljedahl performed.

Bromby and Liljedahl were the defending champions of the regatta and looked to have first place sewn up again during the final race when they were leading but then their mast broke in the strong winds relegating them to a Did Not Finish (85th) and an eventual 17th final placing.

After failing to qualify for his fifth Olympics in 2008 in China having first appeared in Barcelona in 1992, Bromby had pretty much relegated his Olympic career to history.

But the performance in Miami last week has got him to thinking about 2012.

"It is 50-50 on whether I will try for 2012 – but it is certainly in my thoughts," said Bromby who narrowly missed out on a medal when he came fourth at the 2000 Sydney Olympics – ironically the Games where his crewmate last week, Liljedahl, won the gold medal for the US in the Star class.

"Right now my main goal is to stay in touch with what is going on (in the Star class). It was nice going down there for a competitive race and it reminded me that I could compete at a high level. The reality now is that if I do not go to the 2012 Olympics it will not be because I am not good enough, it will be because I cannot afford it."

The last time Bromby sailed in a Star was back in May during a regatta in New Jersey. Since not qualifying for the 2008 Games the Bermudian has mainly spent his time sailing Etchells on Wednesday nights, competing in International Race Week in Bermuda and sailing assorted dinghies as well as some yachts.

After being buoyed by last week's regatta which had many world class and Olympic sailors competing, Bromby said: "The situation may present itself to make a last minute run at 2012. I fell out of the loop (in the Star class). But if I decide to try for the 2012 Olympics it will be a short, abbreviated effort."

And like his previous four Olympics – Barcelona in 1992, Atlanta in 1996, Sydney in 2000 and Athens in 2004 – Bromby said that if he decided to try for 2012 he will have Lee White as crew.

"I have sailed with him for so long now – he knows what he has to do. In Miami I jumped right into the boat (and did very well) – I know not everybody could do that. The hard part will be getting sponsorship. I know that it will be difficult especially since we have already committed the Christmas Tree money to other uses."

Every year Bromby and White bring in Christmas trees to sell and that money went to their Olympic campaign. Since 2008 they have allocated much of the money to youth sailing.

"We want to help out the younger sailors," he said.

Reflecting on last week's Bacardi regatta, Bromby said: "In the final race we were leading by a solid two minutes and change and then broke the rig – busted the mast. We were on our way to winning the series. We had sailed the first four races in light air and were pretty well unstoppable and we were one of the bigger teams there."

American skipper Rick Merriman and crew Phil Trinter were in second place and when Bromby's mast broke it was their title. Four other boats saw their masts break in the winds.

Merriman said: "We had good speed off the start staying with everyone, and then we were able to hit one tack that edged us out ahead of Andy Horton and got us trailing Bromby. We were right behind him (Bromby) until he broke his mast trying to jib in one of the bigger puffs at the mark.

"Then the wind luckily backed off for us a little and we were able to survive the jib, after that, we just focused on sailing conservatively. We played with a couple good shifts and protected the left, making sure we didn't let anyone get out in front of us."

While competing in Miami, Bromby was also watching how Bermuda's Byte team were doing in the Cayman Islands where they were trying to qualify for the first ever Youth Olympics this summer in Singapore.

"I was following it when I was away , I was hoping the kids did well – 16 countries fighting over four spots in the Youth Olympics – and I was happy that we qualified."

And he had particular words of praise for the top Bermudian, Rahiem Steede who came fifth.

"That was encouraging because he has been in the shadows for a while. To me he looks like he has a lot of talent and this is a break-out event for him and that is encouraging.

"The more top level sailing we can get these kids the better it will be.

"I would have loved to have had something like the Youth Olympics when I was coming up. It puts you into high level competition at the young age and it is the pathway for these young guys to the Olympics."