Honour Roll
Tyler Dozzi
In 2015, Terrace, B.C.’s Tyler Dozzi moved 1, 400-kilometres south to Victoria, to further his career as a runner. He enrolled in the 11th grade at Oak Bay High School and joined the Prairie Inn Harriers Youth team, under the direction of Olympian Bruce Deacon.
Dozzi didn’t initially see himself as a runner. Terrace had an annual city track meet that he’d enter for fun. “I did OK, so joined a club and started racing in middle school.,” Dozzi recalls. His first breakthrough came in Grade 8, in an unlikely match-up. “I was in some races with the Grade 12 girls’ national champion in the 2,000m steeplechase,” Dozzi says. “My coach told me not to chase her because she was too fast, but I beat her, which was a shock. That was a turning point.”
In Langley, during the 2015 provincial track championships, Dozzi was knocked down and spiked early into the 3,000m event, but got up and won the race anyway, defeating a future Prairie Inn Harriers teammate Jack Stanley. “I don’t think I worked so hard in any race, ever,” admits Dozzi of his next breakthrough performance. “I was just able to out-kick Jack.”
Stanley and Dozzi are now good friends. They push each other in training and have similar interests in school. “I love training with Jack, he is also very smart. He is in two or three advanced math and science classes; basically he’s a genius.”
The reason why Dozzi left his hometown: Terrace has one track, and it’s nearly impossible to train there during winter. And even in the summer, the facilities are challenging. “The track is crowned in the middle,” Dozzi says. “With the colder winters, training often consisted of me playing indoor basketball.”
By contrast, Oak Bay just completed construction of a $51-million building. The school also comes equipped with its own 400m track. They have a long tradition of winning in various sports, especially running at the regional and provincial levels.
It appears that the move is working as planned. Dozzi is on the principal’s list for academic achievement. “I love calculus,” he says. “Oak Bay is a great school, with year-round training, the running club and a fantastic group of athletes – it’s exactly why I made the big move away from my family. This is what I was looking for.”
Dozzi is hoping for an athletic scholarship to an American college where he can compete in the ncaa, but is open to the idea of staying local and attending a Canadian school. The University of Victoria is just a 10-minute run up Foul Bay Road, where the men’s team is the reigning national crosscountry champion. UVic also just completed a major construction project adding a stunning, world-class sporting facility to the tune of $77 million.
“I knew that if I wanted to earn a scholarship to a good school, I needed to come to Victoria,” Dozzi says of his bold move far away from home.
In January, Dozzi raced the Pioneer 8k i n Victoria, where he finished as the second junior in 27:31, right behind Jack Stanley. Just a couple of weeks later, Dozzi and his club travelled to New York City, arriving during one of the worst blizzards in the history of the northeast U. S. at the Gotham Cup in Brooklyn. “Then Bruce convinced the organizers to not only bring back a race that was cancelled, he got me into a race that I was not on the start list for – he has great negotiating skills.” It’s a good thing he did, as Dozzi continued his trajectory of improvement. “I got two personal bests,” says the 17-year old glowingly of his 2:04.15 800m and 8:49. 47 3,000m performances. Christopher Kelsall is a contributing editor to Canadian Running.