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That included taking part in Sunday morning's 9 mile march and shoot competition. Well today, the officers who made it to the end of 4 tough weeks were celebrated with a graduation ceremony. It was, like the Ceremonial Swearing of the House of Representatives, dampened due to the intermittent rains. Despite that, these soldiers proudly accepted the respect and acknowledgement of their commanding officers. 7News was there this evening, and here's what they told us:

Brigadier General David Jones - Commander, BDF
"We had two courses culminating today. We had the range management qualification. We range management entails weapon handling. Teaching the students how to handle the weapon properly. How to disassembly it. How to clean it and even in the dark they are able to disassemble the weapon and even assemble it again. Then teaching the soldiers how to actually fire the weapon properly. teaching them the marksman principles from 1-4 and ensuring that they are hitting the target properly, using different fire positions - what is the best fire positions to hit different targets and that was a 4 week course. The other course was what they refer to as fire team commander's course. We refer to it in the Belize Defence Force as the junior non-commission officer's course. That is the first rank that a private soldier would get after they are qualified for a promotion. It's normally a 6 weeks course, but we've compressed it with British Army and we took advantage of the British Army being here for them to teach that course for us. We are grateful that they were trained by the British Army because we haven't had such training imparted to us from the British Army for quite some time."

Cpt. Mark Bagguley - OC, Trainer
"I think we have the luxury where no two days are the same. So in respect to that, both sources are very unique. So if you can picture an average day for those would be instructional techniques on weapon systems and then instructing those weapons systems back to their contemporaries and firing on the ranges which we saw students conducting during week three. The fire team commander's course, just touching on those as we saw on week 3. You saw them getting through their paces and digging in deep on the marching shoe and then shooting. So that is probably a good snapshot of an average day."

We also got a chance to speak with the top performers of both courses, and they told us about what they had to do to outlast a number of their peers who signed up but dropped out due to the level of difficulty.

Lance Corporal Leon Flowers
"From the first day we reported it was challenging. Because we didn't have any clue or idea of what will be coming for the first day. So probably the first day we have like 70 of us on the course. They had a physical that we had to take and it was challenging and as time goes by, it start to get more challenging. Guys who wouldn't made up their minds to do it, they just decide to back off. I am willing to take it on to another level. As it is from this day, I am willing to take up the cross and walk with it and carry it on to teach the rest of the guys at my unit and enforce itself."

Staff Sgt. Delton Morgan
"This course was split into two phase. The thing was new was the information. They brought updated pamphlet and that's the thing that I really grasps from. The range management part of the course, it's new to me a little bit. Because they went in dept. In the BDF we don't really go in-depth, but when those guys teach the range management they go in-depth. So the information is new to me. I didn't know it before and so I am going to try put it in our training program for us to be better in the Force. When you go on those operation you would get briefed. You normally get information for you to know more or less what to approach. But certain situation you got to use your head more or less and know what is danger. It's up to you to know if that is danger or not. You shouldn't be hasty most of the time. From the experience that we have in the Force and the amount of lecture we have, we know exactly how to react and we know exactly when it is dangerous for our health or our troops."

Lance Corporal Leon Flowers was one of the 3 top performing officers from the Fire Team Commanders Course who earned a promotion today because they completed the training.