With the opening ceremony of the 2008 Olympic Games scheduled for this Friday, Royal Gazette sports editor Adrian Robson is already in Beijing and will be filing profiles of the Bermuda athletes taking part.

He starts today with a look at triathlete Flora Duffy.

FLORA DUFFY

Event: Triathlon

Age: 20

Coach: Richard Brady (UK)

School: Kelly College, Devon, UK.

Olympic manager: Neil de Ste. Croix

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Although just 20 years-old, Duffy has been making sports headlines for as long as most of us can remember - an age group champion in the Front Street Mile while still at primary school, she was leading the field home in the same event well into her teens.

But the former Warwick Academy student wasn't just successful on the road, but also in the pool and on the bike.

No surprise then that she ultimately progressed into triathlon, perhaps the most challenging and demanding of all Olympic sports, given the gruelling training schedule required to reach the top.

But Duffy's success, in recent months at least, has been tinged with a fairly heavy dose of disappointment.

Some believe it might be a classic case of burn-out - too much training, too many events in too little time with her body still developing.

Doctors have confirmed that fatigue was the most likely cause, by her own high standards, of a string of poor performances which have baffled herself, her coach, her family and all those who have followed her meteoric rise from schoolgirl athlete to international star.

As such, she travels to Beijing without the pressure that might have been evident had she continued her upward spiral following an outstanding display at the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne two years ago when she stunned the triathlon world, placing eighth in a field full of professionals.

No longer are there high expectations.

She admits she wants no more than to savour the atmosphere and experience of competing on the globe's biggest stage.

Now, as has always been the case, the ultimate goal is the Olympics of 2012 in London when theoretically she should have reached her prime.

In Melbourne, as the youngest competitor at 18, she slashed four and a half minutes off her previous best time over the Olympic course, clocking an outstanding two hours, 35.13 seconds.

She emerged from the water among the lead pack, kept the leaders in her sights on the bike and, in blistering heat, romped home in eighth place, leaving a bunch of seasoned pros in her wake.

It was a result that vaulted her into the senior world rankings for the first time.

On-course commentators described her as 'triathlon's name of the future'. She was later afforded the ultimate compliment from former world champion Karen Smyers who said 'Flora might be a genuine prospect to earn the title I once owned'.

The year 2006 continued to be one to remember.

In July, she placed 24th at her first Triathlon World Cup event in Salford, England in 2:08:24. A month later she finished first in the junior division of the Michelob London Triathlon, clocking 1:11:38 over the sprint course.

September brought a silver medal at the ITU World Junior Triathlon Championships in Lausanne, Switzerland (1:05:07 over a sprint course) and a ninth place finish at the World Cup event in Hamburg where she was again the youngest competitor at 19.

Her time of 1:55.47 set a new personal record.

In the same month she got chance to test the same course she faces again in less than two weeks' time, placing 19th at another World Cup race in Beijing (2:08.18).

A scintillating display followed at the World Cup in Cancun, Mexico where the young Bermudian galloped home in sixth in 2:02:28.

It was sufficient to earn a $10,000 grant from the International Triathlon Union. And back in Bermuda, her efforts were recognised early in 2007 when she was named Female Athlete of the Year.

In May, 2007, she earned her best-ever finish at a World Cup event, placing fifth in Lisbon, Portugal in 2:06.46.6.

But a couple of months later, for the first time, there were signs that her young body might be rebelling.

Flora failed to finish the World Cup in Madrid, Spain, and in the same series could only manage 24th in Des Moines, USA, (2:19:54)

In July, 2007, she placed a very respectable 12th at the Pan-Am Games in Rio de Janeiro (2.03.13), but back in England, she trailed home 47th in the Salford World Cup event (2:19:19).

Clearly all was not well. She pulled out of the Beijing pre-Olympic event due to fatigue and posted a 'DNF' at the World Cup in Hamburg.

Since then, the struggles have continued.

A 27th place at La Paule in a France Grand Prix sprint, where she was representing the Poissy Tri Duathlon Club Team for the first time; 43rd at the World Cup in Rhodes, Greece, yet another DNF at Richards Bay in South Africa; 17th at the Under-23 World Cup Championships in Vancouver and 19th at the World Championships in Hamburg.

Tiredness again caught up with her at her most recent race in the National Elite Championships in Wales, where she never saw the finish line.

Well rested entering the trip to China, it remains to be seen how she now stands among the world's very best.

But as she and her coach continue to insist, London is still the target.