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Lutaaya ready ready for international mark
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The gun shot to take off will mark the 16 year old’s debut at the World Aquatics Championships, where he joins female counterpart Swagiah Mubiru in the open water swimming competition, a feat that seemed over five years ago.
In the wee hours of Friday morning here, Benjamin Lutaaya will stand before the world.
His muscles will definitely be tense beneath his wetsuit, but his heartbeat, you bet, will be steady — not just from calm, but also from the quiet certainty of purpose. His eyes will be focused on diving into the water at Sentosa Island whose restless surface will be painted gold by the morning Singaporean sun.
The gun shot to take off will mark the 16 year old’s debut at the World Aquatics Championships, where he joins female counterpart Swagiah Mubiru in the open water swimming competition, a feat that seemed over five years ago.
Back then in March 2020, he had been just another emerging swimmer at the then Uganda Swimming Federation National Inter-Primary Schools Gala held at Greenhill Academy. The cheers of the crowd are still fresh in his memory, as was the terrifying moment when his arms gave out mid-race and the water nearly swallowed him whole. He had nearly drowned that day. For many, it would have been the end.
“I used to be a footballer like my dad (Dennis), but in Primary Four, my coach at Kampala Junior Academy told me to try swimming for fitness,” Lutaaya, who went on to love the sport and take part in his maiden gala the same year, shares.
Fear of God, beginning…
A deeply God-fearing young man, he believed his survival was more than chance — it was a calling. That scare did not pull him away from the water, but pulled him deeper into it, with a quiet voice whispering that his story wasn’t over yet.
Ironically, that was the last gala for a while as the world went into lock down due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Lutaaya had time to reflect but his comeback story stood in jeopardy
“I do not know how I found myself back but I joined the ‘learn to swim’ class at Dolphins and kept building. It can only attribute this progress to God. As you read the Bible, you find that pattern that builds your consistency and motivation in life. There have been plenty of times where I did not want to be at the pool but that motivation pushed me,” Lutaaya recounts. He later joined Gators in 2022 and the rest as they say is history.
“He is so passionate about distance swimming and he is a very disciplined and hardworking individual,” Gators’ coach Muzafaru Muwanguzi, says.
Getting noticed
Lutaaya’s promise in distance swimming has shone through over the last two years. He was fourth finisher in the 800m freestyle race at the 2024 Uganda Aquatics Nationals in a time of 10:06.57. He also finished 4th in the 200m breaststroke (2:44.94), and 7th in both the 200m freestyle (2:14.21) and individual medley (2:33.43) in the 15-16 boys’ age group.
He was selected as part of a four-man team that represented Uganda at the Africa Aquatics Open Water Swimming Training Camp in Zanzibar in September and also took part in the 20th edition of the Africa Zone IV Championship later in December in Namibia, where he also took part in the open water competition and completed the 5km course in 1 hour,13 minutes, 43 seconds, and 47 microseconds (1:13:43.47).
At the Nationals this year, he was Gators’ captain and also took down his 800m free time to 9:52.93 but his sprints (50m and 100m races) also looked better. He would have wished to do much better in the 200m breaststroke (2:45.76), where he did not have a personal best, and in the 200m freestyle (2:12.13), where the improvement was slight.
"Our training was mostly sprints based and maybe that affected the distance events a bit, but I would definitely have loved to cut more time.
“The captaincy adds a bit of pressure but forces you to perform above a certain standard. And I think it went well because we delivered the fourth straight title,” Lutaaya says.
The future
Muwanguzi believes that his captain “most likely has a comparative advantage in open water swimming” and that since this is just the “start of his international career, he needs to work hard and lay a good foundation that will allow him to continue competing at that level in the future.”
Lutaaya is alive to the expectations that come with this “one in a million chance. I know I am going to do my best, get the experience, and get the areas I want to improve in in order to continue to rise to the next level.”
He also has younger brothers in Berekiah, 11, and Benaiah, 12, to inspire – although the latter is now more focused on basketball and football than swimming.
“He (Berekiah) has a bright future because he started young and is already training with us in the main group.”
World Aquatics Championships
Friday – Open water
Women’s 5km: Swagiah Mubiru, 2.30am
Men’s 5km: Benjamin Lutaaya, 5am
Lutaaya at a glance
Name: Benjamin Lutaaya
Date of birth: Dec 26, 2006
Club: Gators
Parents: Dennis & Jackie Lutaaya
Swimming siblings: Berekiah & Benaiah
Code: Open water swimming
School: King’s Learning Christian Academy
Class: Grade 9
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