Winnipeg’s Pan-Am Pool was the springboard which somersaulted Janet Ruth Nutter into prominence on the International diving scene.

As a youngster she stood out from her competitive cohorts. Religiously she was casting her tall, slender and flexible body from the lofty 10-metre tower and 3 metre springboard with championship form. It was the precision with which Nutter executed difficult dives that made her Manitoba champion from 1969-75.

In that interval she captured a gold medal in the 3 metre springboard, a silver in the 10-metre tower and a bronze medal in the 1 metre springboard in the 1973 Canada Games in Burnaby, B.C. That same academic year, 1973-74, she was named University of Manitoba female athlete of the year.

A member of the national team since 1971, she was now poised for the international arena.

In the 1975 Pan-Am Games, she plunged from the 10-metre tower and surfaced in the Mexico City pool with a gold medal.

Focusing now on the international scene, Nutter flashed her brilliance in the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, Alberta. She captured a gold medal in the 3 metre springboard and bronze medal in the 10-metre tower. This earned her a spot on the Canadian team, which competed the same year in the 1978 World Aquatic Games in Berlin, West Germany.

In 1979, Nutter was a bronze medalist in the 3 metre springboard in the Pan-Am Games in San Juan, Puerto Rico and a silver medalist in the same event in the 1979 FINA World Cup in Woodlands, Texas.

Janet Nutter’s career, which spanned a decade of hard work and self discipline, served as an inspiration to all Manitobans especially those in the aquatic world.