Tauranga's Lochlainn O'Connor has had a strong start to the Junior Pan Pacific Swimming Champs in Fiji, smashing his personal best to make the final of his specialist event, the 200m butterfly.

The Greerton Swim Club athlete swam a time of 2:03.25 in yesterday morning's heats in Suva, beating his previous PB by 0.95s, to qualify seventh fastest for the final.

The time is also a Bay of Plenty record.

He couldn't quite maintain the pace in last night's final, easing out to a time of 2:03.80 to finish seventh. American Gianluca Urlando took the gold in the event in a time of 1:56.25.

Rotorua's Paddy Baylis finished 14th in the toughest event in the pool, the 1500m freestyle, in a time of 16:06.55, just 1.14 seconds outside his personal best.

Lochlainn was one of nine kiwi swimmers to make finals on day one of the junior Pan Pacs.

He is also competing in tomorrow's 100m butterfly, though as he's seeded 17th in the event will need to pull out an exceptional effort to make the final.

To fill the other days of racing he is competing in the individual medley events. In this morning's 400m IM heats he finished 17th, improving his PB by 1.29s to 4:42.31, but failing to make the B final.