Florida State’s track and field program recruits the world. And as a result, 11 current or former Seminoles will represent seven countries at the London Olympics.

FSU athletes will compete in most of the major track events, including the 100, 200, 400 and the relays.

Kemar Hyman of the Cayman Islands holds his nation’s record in the 100 and broke the 10-second mark by winning at Madrid with a sprint of 9.95 seconds on July 7. It has been a remarkably quick ascent to the top of the track world for Hyman, who was not a serious runner until his junior year of high school.

“I never thought that it would be me,” Hyman said. “I always thought it was going to be somebody else. I really came from the bottom up. For me to produce this and see myself going forward is really good. It’s a relief that I’ve put in so much hard work and it’s really paying off.”

Maurice Mitchell is also seeing his hard work pay off in the 200. He has won the last two NCAA Outdoor titles in that event, and his personal-best 20.14 seconds in the 200 puts him amongst the world’s best and a likely relay option for the U.S. team.

Mitchell said he began thinking about the Olympics when he watched former FSU sprinter Walter Dix win two bronze medals in 2008 at the Beijing Games. While Dix is injured and won’t compete in London, it’s clear that he has had an impact on FSU’s sprinters.

“I’ve always wanted to be in the same footsteps as him,” Mitchell said. “He was a good mentor for me.”

And then there’s Lacy Janson, who loved the pole vault so much that she became frustrated and nearly quit seven months ago. She felt like she had done enough in the sport of track and field, with a pair of NCAA titles and eight Atlantic Coast Conference pole-vault titles – claiming every indoor and outdoor title from 2003-06.

At 29, she already had a busy life between her part-time job, pole-vault training and planning a December wedding with her fiancé, Warren Harper. But in June she made the U.S. team during her third attempt at the Olympic Trials.

“I was super frustrated,” Janson said. “I just thought, ‘You know, I can move on from here. I don’t have to pole vault anymore. It’s frustrating. It’s hard. I can be done with it.’ But then I thought, ‘That’s really silly. Why would you quit on an Olympic year? You worked really hard.’ ”

Among the other competitors that are chasing medals are Hannah England of the United Kingdom, who took second in the 1500 meters at the 2011 World Championships. Jamaica’s Kim Williams has won a combined five NCAA titles in the triple jump and long jump. She will compete in London in the triple jump.

Kevin and Jonathan Borlee will run the 400 for Belgium, and the brothers have already led their country to a first-place finish in the 4×400 relay in the 2012 European Championships.

Current FSU swimmer Mateo De Angulo will compete in the 400 freestyle for Colombia.

The state of Florida is well-represented in London for the 2012 Olympics, though many will be wearing other countries’ colors. That’s especially true for the large number of athletes with connections to Florida’s major universities.

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