16-Yr-Old Tajus Juska Takes 50 Free Title On Day One Of Lithuanian Championships

2025 LITHUANIAN SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS

We saw day one of the 2025 Lithuanian Swimming Championships unfold from Vilnius with the four-day competition representing a World Championships qualifying opportunity for the nation’s athletes.

Day 1 Highlights

Right off the bat, we saw 18-year-old Smilte Plytnykaite produce a new national record in the women’s 50m fly.

The University of Virginia commit clocked a time of 26.64 to set the new mark en route to notching her first-ever outing under the 27-second barrier.

The only other record to go down came at the hands of Domas Vilimas within the age group set.

Vilimas raced the men’s 200m breaststroke where he notched a time of 2:15.36 to capture the silver behind winner Andrius Sidlauskas who took gold in 2:11.91. Vilimas’ performance set a new benchmark for boys’ under 17 years.

The other notable performance of the evening came in the men’s 50m free, where reigning European Junior Championships gold medalist Tajus Juska topped the field in a time of 22.54.

Seasoned Olympian Danas Rapsys settled for silver just .10 behind in 22.64 while Julius Backulis bagged the bronze in 22.87.

Juskas has been as fast as 22.34 in his career, his lifetime best put on the books en route to bronze at last year’s European Junior Championships. It was there where he topped the 100m free podium for gold in 48.74 as the youngest swimmer ever (15 years of age) to break the 49-second barrier.

In This Story

2
Leave a Reply

Subscribe
Notify of

2 Comments
newest
oldest most voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Paella747
11 hours ago

I want Juska to keep dropping time. Hope he can pull off a best time in the 100 free. Go LTU!

Dee
21 hours ago

Pretty swift for Rapsys, guess it makes sense for him to move down in distance with the 400 progressing internationally and the Lithuania freestyle relays developing so well.

About Retta Race

Former Masters swimmer and coach Loretta (Retta) thrives on a non-stop but productive schedule. Nowadays, that includes having earned her MBA while working full-time in IT while owning French 75 Boutique while also providing swimming insight for BBC.

Read More »