A blockbuster second day of competition at the European Aquatics Junior Diving Championships 2025 saw a total of four new European junior titles awarded, with the Opening Ceremony for the diving and imminent artistic swimming competitions taking place on the same evening.
The ceremony consisted of speeches from Kiriakos Giannopoulos, President of the Hellenic Swimming Federation and Vice-President of European Aquatics; Giannis Vroutsis, Minister of Sport for Greece; and Antonio Silva, President of European Aquatics. A parade of the participating nations also took place at the artistic swimming venue to officially open both competitions.
Prior to the evening’s festivities, the qualification for the Boys B 1m Springboard and Girls B 3m Springboard took place, with 19 and 25 divers respectively whittled down to 12 for the final showdowns.
The Boys B 1m Springboard final opened proceedings, and saw neutral athlete Egor Sobolev eern gold with a series of consistent, high-difficulty dives through his four optional final list, with his Reverse 2 ½ Somersaults Tuck (305C) not looking out of place in a senior competition – scoring him a huge 69.00 as he took the top spot with a score of 432.15.
The preliminary round saw Ukraine’s Dmytro Stepanov top the charts, as he made the most of his optionals, but a re-take of his penultimate dive in the final saw him fall out of contention.
The biggest winner from the above was Great Britain’s Simeon Greig. The 15-year-old held his nerve with three consecutive 50+ scores and moved up a place to take the bronze medal with a score of 377.10.
Louis Aaron Foster was another athlete who showed immense consistency. The German, who took Mixed Team gold the previous evening, had all four of his dives above 50 points, including a quick Reverse 1 ½ Somersaults 1 ½ Twists Free (5333D), which secured him 53.30 points in the final round and sealed the silver medal on a total score of 383.00.
The Girls B 3m Springboard final continued in a similar fashion. Germany’s Jella Kiphut led from the end of the required preliminary dives and never relinquished the lead – ranking first in each of her three final dives en route to victory, with her Back 2 ½ Somersaults Tuck (205C), her opening dive of the evening, taking the plaudits with a score of 63.00 on her way to a final tally of 356.05.
The other two podium finishers both had their own journeys through the rounds as they made their way through the ranks. Yelyzaveta Diadiuk of Ukraine was a prime example of the surge through the leaderboards that the sport can provide. Despite an early drop out of the podium places, she held firm with two difficult dives towards the end, including a finale of a 55.50-scoring Forward 2 ½ Somersaults 1 Twist Pike (5152B) which saw her leapfrog Italy’s Giorgia Tasca into second place, who suffered a drop on her final dive to fall out of the medals.
The bronze medal was taken once again by a British athlete. Siena Rae Mills recovered excellently from a penultimate dive which gave her a mountain to climb, but a score of 56.00 for her Reverse 2 ½ Somersaults Tuck (305C) was enough to usurp the Italian and earn herself a bronze.
The final events of the day came in unison – the Girls and Boys Synchronised Platform finals ran with a mixed-gender order, with Ukraine and Germany making both podiums.
The Ukranian pairing of Nazarii Kononenko and Valerii Malieieiv came out on top in the boys’ final, in what would almost certainly be described as the closest final of the night. Despite sitting fifth with two dives to go, they strung together a brace of 72.00-scoring dives, both with a 3.2 degree of difficulty, to take the gold medal.
That came at the expense of Jordan Fisher-Eames and Robbie Wood, who were on course to take the gold with one dive to go, but even an impressive 67.20 for their Inward 3 ½ Somersaults Tuck (407C) wasn’t enough to see them hold on, as they had to settle for silver.
Germany’s Iven Penzyna and Ole Johannes Rosler were sitting comfortably inside the top four throughout the event, and their two 70+ scoring dives in the second half was enough to ensure they stayed inside the top-three in the end as they took the bronze medal.
The girls event saw neutral athletes Viktoriia Kazantseva and Aleksandra Kedrina take the plaudits with a thoroughly dominant display. Following their required dives, they strung together a 64, 66 and 68-point series of optionals to rank first at every stage and seal the gold.
Germany’s Jule Leonie Eisenberg and Charlotte Lederer maintained a good level of consistency to take the silver medal – as they forced Ukraine’s Alisa Meishkova and Sofiia Vystavkina into third place, despite an impressively consistent performance from themselves.
The results from the day mean that Germany are ranked first in the medal table, with five trips to the podium from the first two days. Day three gets underway at 9:30am local time with a mixture of springboard and platform events to excite the Athens Olympic Aquatic Center crowd.
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Stephen Stanley for European Aquatics
