He is Kenneth Medwood - and if you're not familiar with the name, it's because he is a 24 year old Belizean American - who was born in Belize City in 1987.

He has represented Belize at a number of International track and field events and he was the flag bearer for the Belize delegation at the Olympic opening ceremony.

And now, he's the first Belizean runner to advance to the semifinal of any event. We'll show you his race shortly - but today's excitement started early in the morning with Kiana Martinez. She's the Seine Byte resident who participated in the women's preliminary heat for the hundred meters this morning in London.

The preliminary round is like a wild card round for those trying to earn a berth into the first round.

The race started at ten minutes to four this morning in Belize and it was aired live right here on on Channel 7.

Here's the race call as they lined up for Heat Two of the preliminaries:..

kaina medwood 1 from 7News Belize on Vimeo.

With that second place finish she advanced to the first round. Her time of 11.81 seconds was her best for the season, but still slower than her personal best of 11.64.

And she'd need her personal best and better as she headed into round one - populated by women who can run the 100 in less than 11.20 seconds.

That's the big leagues - and that race was run eight hours later - at 7:30 London time which was 12:30 pm in Belize. Here's how it went...

kaina medwood 2 from 7News Belize on Vimeo.

You saw it correctly. Kiana came in dead last in Heat number seven with a time of 11.89 seconds - slower than her run in the preliminaries. Not a glorious end, but the first Belizean woman to advance out of the preliminary round.

And so then it was unto the four hundred meters hurdles for men. That's Kenneth MEdwood's event, and here's how that race went. They ran at about 4:15 am this morning, Belize time:

kaina medwood 3 from 7News Belize on Vimeo.

With his time of 49.78 seconds Medwood just made it into the semi-finals of the 400 meter hurdles. He becomes the first Belizean male to make it into the semifinals of any event.