2024 HUNGARIAN SC CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Wednesday, November 6th – Saturday, November 9th
- Kaposvar, Hungary
- SCM (25m)
- Day 1 Recap
- Results
The 2024 Hungarian Short Course Championships continued from Kaposvar with another national age record biting the dust.
This time it was on the men’s side, with 15-year-old Oliver Papai firing off a new lifetime best of 3:45.16 to grab the gold and establish the new age standard in the 400m free.
Papai held off Nandor Negy who settled for silver just a hair back in 3:45.22 while open water ace Kristof Rasovszky clinched bronze in 3:45.82.
Teenager Papai actually logged a new age record out of the morning heats, earning the #2 seed in a new PB of 3:48.44. That overwrote Richard Marton‘s previous age standard for 15-year-olds which stood at 3:50.28 put on the books in 2014. That means Papai is Hungary’s first-ever swimmer of his age to dip under the 3:50 barrier and he did it in a very big way.
5Additional Notes
- Marton was indeed in the water this evening taking on the men’s 200m fly where he got to the wall first in 1:53.12, capturing gold by over 2 seconds.
- The men’s 100m back saw Adam Jaszo take the victory in 51.46, the sole outing of the field under the 52-second barrier.
- Panna Ugrai hit a mark of 58.67 to hold off USC commit Dora Molnar who settled for silver in 58.92. Gerda Szilagyi was also under the minute barrier in 59.69.
- Szebasztian Szabo, who recently saw his SCM 50 fly world record get surpassed on the World Cup, notched a winning result of 21.49 to top the men’s 50m free podium. There was a tie in the women’s edition. Petra Senanszky and Kiara Viktoria Pozvai both clocked 24.89 for co-gold and Ugrai was next in 24.93 as the bronze medalist.
- Ajna Kesely got the job done din the women’s 400m free, posting 4:07.33 to beat out Nikolett Padar‘s effort of 4:08.81. Veteran Boglarka Kapas rounded out the podium in 4:09.27 and the newly-minted 1500m free age group record holder from last night, Vivien Jackl produced 4:09.28 for 4th place.
Wow, men’s mid-distance/distance swimming looks to be entering a golden era of amazing competition. WR from Bobby Finke recently, Luka Mijatovic smashing the US 15/16 500 scy record, these kids Papai & Negy, the new kids from Tunisia Rahmouni & Jaouadi. If course they all need to continue to develop, but LA 2028 could feature a lot of young talent making names for themselves.