[1] His personal coach was Richard Domey, and in the fall of 1987 Bankert trained in West Yellowstone with the U.S. Olympic biathlon team.
[1] To be eligible to compete at the Winter Olympic Games, Bankert needed to successfully complete two sanctioned biathlons competitions.
He finished his second such competition on February 7, 1988, just three days before the Opening Ceremony,[1] at which he carried the flag of Guam as its only athlete at the 1988 Winter Olympic Games.
This, combined with the fact that he represented a tropical island, made his a human interest story reported extensively in the media.
In the men's 10 km sprint event, Bankert missed eight out of the ten rifle targets and as a result had to ski eight penalty laps.