Lithuania in the News
24th August 2008
Lithuania’s Remarkable Success at the Beijing Olympics 2008
Mindaugas Mizgaitis, bronze mdeal winner in wrestling.
Photo courtesy www.olimpiada.lt

Virgilijus Alekna, bronze medal winner in discus
throwing. Photo courtesy Lithuanian National
Olympic Committee website
Gintarė Volungevičiūtė silver medal winner in sailing.
Photo courtesy www.olimpiada.lt

Edvinas Krungolcas and Andrejus Zadneprovskis silver
and bronze medal winners in the pentathlon.
Photo courtesy www.olimpiada.lt
Lithuania’s Olympic medal tally to date stands at two silver and three bronze, with a possible fourth bronze to come. The first Beijing Olympics medal for Lithuania was won by the wrestler Mindaugas Mizgaitis (a bronze). It was followed by a silver in sailing by Gintarė Volungevičiūtė. Another bronze was won by the discus thrower Virgilijus Alekna, gold medalist at the last two Olympics.
A remarkable feat was achieved in the modern pentathlon by Lithuania winning two medals – a silver by Edvinas Krungolcas and a bronze by Andrejus Zadneprovskis. This is the first time in Lithuania’s Olympics history that Lithuania has won two medals in the same event. Andrejus Zadneprovskis had previously won silver in the Athens Olympics.
Lithuania’s basketball team made an excellent start in its group by winning their first four matches, which assured them the top position in their group. In their fifth match they got a thorough drubbing by Australia, but fortunately this did not change anything in their group ranking and Lithuania went on to play China in the quarter finals. They defeated China (94:68), but in the semifinals were defeated by the world champions Spain (91:86) after an intense battle. Lithuania will now play Argentina for the bronze on Sunday 24/8/08 (2pm EST). Lithuania’s basketballers have managed to reach the semifinals in all the Olympics that Lithuania has participated in since regaining independence and have won three bronzes so far, in Barcelona (1992), Atlanta (1996) and Sydney (2000).
In terms of total medals per head of population, even the 5 medals so far puts Lithuania way ahead of all the top scoring nations, except Australia! Extrapolated to Australia’s population, Lithuania’s five medals so far would be equivalent 30, compared to Australia’s actual total medal tally of 42 (as of Saturday morning 23/8/08). Since Lithuania has already defeated Argentina in an earlier match in these Olympics, it has a good chance of winning its fourth bronze medal. A total of six Olympic medals would be a remarkable achievement for Lithuania.
Further information: www.lietuvosrytas.lt    Lithuanian National Olympics Committee website www.ltok.lt   www.olimpiada.lt