Whitehorse Glacier Bear Haley Braga followed in the footsteps of Alexandra Gabor and Bronwyn Pasloski last week when she was chosen as part of the B.C. swim team to compete at the 2010 Pacific Coast All Star meet in Cerritos, California.

The meet takes place from Jan. 9 to 10, and will be Braga's biggest competition to date.

"It'll be my first big one,” she said on Friday, as she took a quick break from practice to talk about the upcoming meet.

Already the 12-year-old swimmer is hard at work training. While other Glacier Bear swimmers are taking a break for the holidays, Braga will be hitting the pool as much as possible over Christmas under the direction of coach Marek Poplawski.

"I scheduled for her, extra practices,” said Poplawski.

Braga has a busy few weeks ahead of her as she prepares for the California meet. She will swim twice a day this week, first for a training camp, then for her regular practice. She has five practices before Poplawski heads to Australia with the National Junior Swim Team for a training camp on Dec. 27. In his absence, Braga will swim with another coach until her meet.

"I'm really excited, I'm counting the days,” she said.

Poplawski said her achievement is something to be proud of.

"I think this is a huge accomplishment,” he said. The coach said the under 12 category in B.C. is extremely tough to be recognized in, as the number of swimmers in that age group is much larger than any other.

She also managed to qualify by swimming in only a few meets.

"She's not swimming that many,” said Poplawski. "It's fantastic.”

Poplawski said Braga's success is largely based on how dedicated she is to her sport.

"I think mainly (it's) because she's working so hard,” said Poplawski.

Braga isn't focusing on where she'll place, but just hopes to do her best and possibly improve her times.

"I'm hoping to get (personal bests),” she said.

The young athlete isn't intimidated by the fact that this will be her biggest competition to date, and hopes to focus on what's important – her performance – so it won't be her last.

"I'm just not really going to focus on it, I'm just going to focus on trying to get a good time,” said Braga.

Braga qualified based on her time at the recent 2009 PCS Xmas Cracker SC Invitational meet that was held in Victoria.

Swimmers were awarded points by FINA based on their placing at meets between September 15 and December 15, and after Braga's impressive showing in Victoria, she was a last minute addition to the team with 568 points overall.

Braga managed to squeak in to qualify at the Christmas meet held Dec. 11 to 13.

"I was officially on the team today (Friday),” Braga said.

Some of Braga's best accomplishments at the Christmas Cracker meet include fifth place in the 200 metre butterfly with a time of 2:47.29; eighth in the 100 metre backstroke with a time of 1:17.46;

sixth place in the 400 metre free with a time of 4:47.69, an event that Gabor holds the B.C. and meet records for with times of 4:22.38 and 4:26.92; and third in the 100 metre free with a time of 1:04.39, which Gabor also holds the B.C. and meet record for with times of 58.04 and 59.27.

Braga is certainly in good company with her achievement, becoming a member of a very exclusive club of Whitehorse swimmers who are seeing success on a national and international scale.

Braga began swimming about five years ago, non-competitively, until she joined the Whitehorse Glacier Bears. This is her fourth season with the swim club.

In his time with the Glacier Bears, Poplawski said Braga is only the third swimmer he has coached that has made the B.C. team.