Whitehorse native Tuja Dreyer has been named to the Canadian Junior Pan Pacific Championships swim team. 

Dreyer, who swims with the Island Swim Club out of Victoria, won the Junior 200 and 400 Individual Medleys at the 2024 Bell Olympic & Paralympic Trials, which took place in Toronto, May 13-19. 

The Individual Medley, or IM, as it is known, consists of the Butterfly, Backstroke, Breaststroke and Freestyle (normally the front crawl). 

“Going into the 400 IM, I was quite nervous for my first race, “recalled Dreyer. “It was my first swim at any trials, so having it being the Olympic trials definitely had some nerves for me.”

Dreyer qualified in seventh place for the 400 IM finals. Dreyer said that was “not ideal for me, but I made it work in finals.”

He said the race went “pretty well. 

“I got to implement my race strategy that my coach was telling me about. I think I paced the race pretty evenly as well.” 

Dreyer got off to a fast start during the butterfly (fly) segment.

He said “it was a pretty close race at the end.”  

Tanner Cole caught Dreyer during the third segment, the breaststroke.

“I was pretty much neck-and-neck with (Cole),” related Dreyer.

Dreyer pulled ahead at the end of the race, edging Cole by 40 tenths of a second for the gold. 

Next up for Dreyer was the 200 IM.

“200 was on the sixth day, so I had quite a bit of time to regroup.”

“For me, it’s more difficult than the 400, since it’s just 50 (metres) of every stroke, so you basically have to be perfect. There’s no room for error. 

“I was pleasantly surprised, I guess. It was the only prelim I actually got the best time in the entire meet. So going into finals, I was seeded first and that gave me confidence and it just carried over into my race.”

Dreyer won the 200 by 44 tenths of a second. 

“I’m overall happy about it. I was a little nervous because I didn’t make the (standard) times for Pan-Pacs (Pan Pacific Championships). But you can still get a spot without it.”

Dreyer said the 200 and 400 IM are his best races. He also mentioned that he doesn’t worry about what other swimmers are doing. He just focuses on his own races. 

Dreyer’s home community is Ross River. He is part of the Ross River Dena Council.

The youth, 16, attributes his success to his coaches and teammates. 

“My teammates always push me.”

Dreyer said leading into the trials, they got a good work block in. 

“Then about two weeks into the meet we started tapering off and focusing on the details of our races.”

Dreyer’s coach, Lucien Zucchi, went over their game plan. 

“He was talking about how we were gonna train for the meet, which is really helpful. Just, what I was gonna do, what I would have to focus on.” 

Zucchi told Dreyer last Friday that he had made the nationals Junior team.

Needless to say, Dreyer was “really happy” when he received the good news. 

The Junior Pan-Pacs, as they are known, run from Aug. 21-24 in Canberra, the capital city of Australia. 

The team will be flying there on Aug. 12. 

“I feel excited. My mother already made plans, so I was going to travel afterwards.”

Dreyer and his mother, Doris, will spend one week in Australia after the meet. 

As for the near future, in addition to training, Dreyer has two major swim meets coming up – the Mel Zajac Jr. International Swim Meet June 21-23 in Vancouver and the Canadian Junior Championships July 24-30 in Toronto.