Liechtenstein’s only Olympian: ‘Andy Murray found me in the village’

Pin swapping is big business in the Olympic village. Every country has their own unique little pin and a popular way to pass the time outside training and competition is to collect as many as you can by trading your own.

Andy Murray is an expert. After gathering a hefty collection at his final Games in Paris, Murray began seeking out the rarest pieces which sent him on the hunt for Liechtenstein’s sole athlete: the 20-year-old mountain biker Romano Puntener, one of nearly 15,000 people staying in the 54-hectare Olympic Village.

Murray being Murray, he found him. “I was really surprised,” says Puntener. “It was after dinner when me and my mechanic took some bikes and rode through the village, and he saw me. I didn’t expect to meet him on my first evening there at the Olympic Village.

“I was a bit surprised that he asked me for a Liechtenstein pin; I knew that pin trading is a big thing at the Olympics but I didn’t know that superstars like Andy Murray do that. That was really cool to meet him and talk with him about his last tournament and about my first Olympics, and how it is to be the only athlete from Liechtenstein.”

If pins are Olympic currency, Puntener soon found he was one of the richest men in the village. “To be honest, there were more people asking me about trading pins than me asking others about trading,” he smiles. French Open champion Coco Gauff and his idol Nino Schurter – “the GOAT of mountain biking,” he says – were two of his favourite trades.

Puntener carried a tiny Alpine nation on his shoulders in Paris but he was not entirely alone. He travelled in a party of four with a team manager, Liechtenstein’s chef de mission and his bike mechanic, and the Swiss team took him under their wing so he had some company in the village.

In the build-up to the Games, he received messages from seemingly all 40,000 people in his homeland. “I’ve become a bit more famous because of the Olympics,” he says. The prime minister, Daniel Risch, came to his race and took him for lunch a few days later, which “was probably one of the coolest things”.

He was the obvious choice for flag bearer. Opening ceremony organisers gave him instructions on exactly where to stand on the boat as it flowed down the Seine and exactly how to hold the pole. Two minutes before the world’s TV cameras zoned in, he was given the signal to start waving. “That was probably the biggest thing I have ever experienced in my life. It was a really big honour.”

The men’s mountain bike race took place in a raucous atmosphere on the outskirts of Paris, mainly because a Frenchman led for most of it. Victor Koretzky was beaten at the very last by Britain’s Tom Pidcock, as Puntener came home six minutes later in a creditable 28th place among 36 starters.

“The race itself was the race like all the other races, but the spectators made it really unforgettable. They made me push even harder, and they really spurred me on. Experiencing an amazing crowd on a really cool track, I really liked the course. It treated me very well made and I could really execute a perfect race.”

Along with the prime minister, proud family were there to greet him at the line. “It just shows that they made a few things right in the past couple of years [because] I wouldn’t have been there without them and without their help,” he says.

Puntener rides on the development programme of Swiss team Thomus-Maxon, and is now preparing for the Mountain Bike World Championships in Andorra as he builds towards a professional career in the sport. Here in Paris he got a taste for the Olympics, and he says he wants more in Los Angeles in four years’ time.

Puntener departs Paris as a national treasure, and with a sackful of pins. “The last time I counted, I had 60 pins. I stuck them all on my accreditation.”

And he takes away a little inspiration, too. “It’s really inspiring to see such big names, like Andy Murray, see that they are just like normal people, and to believe maybe you can become as good as they are one day.

“He’s friendly on TV and on the internet, but I’ve never really experienced meeting someone like him, such a successful athlete. That was really cool, I was amazed.”