2024 HUNGARIAN NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
- Tuesday, April 9th – Friday, April 12th
- Duna Arena, Budapest, Hungary
- Prelims at 9am local (3am ET), Finals at 5pm local (11am ET)
- SwimSwam Preview #1/Preview #2
- Day 1 Recap
- Start Lists/Results
- Livestream (Prelims)
Following up on his 48.38 100m free victory from night one of the 2024 Hungarian National Championships, 24-year-old Kristof Milak captured two top seeds to kick off day two.
Milak first took on the men’s 200m fly where the reigning world record holder and Olympic champion turned in a time of 1:55.43.
Splitting 25.06/30.05/30.05/30.27, Milak set himself apart from the field by over a second, with Turkish national record holder Polat Turnali next in line at 1:56.89. The next-closest Hungarian was Richard Marton who secured the #3 spot in 1:58.44.
As a refresher, although Milak has been largely out of the pool since last April’s Hungarian Championships, he already owns Olympic Qualification Times in the 100m (50.80) and 200m fly (1:52.58) from that competition.
The 50m free also saw Milak surge to the top of the pack this morning, posting 22.29 to lane lane 4 for this evening’s final. Bence Szabados snagged the 2nd seed in 22.40 while Nandor Nemeth rounded out the top 3 performers in 22.50.
For Milak, this morning’s outing represents the 4th-best performance of his career as a preview of potentially what’s to come tonight. If he could find a way to drop under the 22-second barrier, Milak would become just the 4th Hungarian man to do so.
Top 5 Hungarian Men’s LCM 50 Free Performers All-Time
- Krisztian Takacs – 21.42, 2009
- Szebasztian Szabo – 21.60, 2022
- Maxim Lobanovskij – 21.77, 2020
- Kristof Milak – 22.06, 2023
- Nandor Nemeth – 22.12, 2023
Arizona State University NCAA champion Zalan Sarkany was in the water this morning as well, on the heels of his announcing he has entered the transfer portal.
20-year-old Sarkany represented 1 of 3 swimmers who notched times in the 3:55 zone in the men’s 400m free heats.
Sarkany narrowly led the field with 3:55.16 with Italy’s Davide Marcello next to the wall in 3:55.45. Kristof Rasovszky, who has already qualified for Paris in the 800m and 1500m free events, snagged the 3rd slot in 3:55.66.
Sarkany owns a lifetime best of 3:47.91 in this event from last December, a time just over a second off of the 3:46.78 World Aquatics Olympic Qualification Time.
Additional Notes
- Portuguese swimmer Ana Monteiro topped the heats of the women’s 200m fly, logging 2:12.65. She is the national record holder in this event, owning a lifetime best of 2:08.03 from 2018.
- The men’s 50m back gold medalist from last night, Adam Jaszo, is looking to double up with potential gold in the 100m back this evening. He scored the top seed in 54.61 as the sole performer under the 55-second threshold.
- Petra Senanszky led Nikolett Padar in this morning’s rounds of the women’s 50m free. The former touched in 25.00 to hold a healthy advantage over the latter who logged 25.80.
- Padar was also in the women’s 400m free heats, securing the #1 seed with an outing of 4:17.52.
My money says solid 100 fly in the works.
Milak 21.89 in 50 free finals.
21.89 after a 1:54 200fly?! Yeah he’s been lifting some.
1:54.90 in finals, so didn’t drop a lot. The splits were still very consistent.
Pretty disappointed with that, from being assured he was back this morning to now being bemused again, maybe he was trying to take pressure off himself by taking it easy in final but I’m not sure.
He does have the 50 free still to come later tonight, but honestly 1:54 is fine I think.
hype train derailed F
hype train back on track after that 50 free cho cho cho
Why do they keep saying he was out of the pool for a majority of the time since last April
Do you have other (confirmed) information?
My apologies Kristof, I was unfamiliar with your game
Finals is gonna be devious
Devious? What does that mean in a swimming context? Like a politician such as Adam Schiff? Or a magician such as David Copperfield or Penn & Teller? Or an unfaithful husband sneaking out at night? Or a card shark dealing from the bottom of the deck?
Whatever it is, I’m certainly going to be paying close attention to the finals! Thanks for the heads up!
Video: https://m4sport.hu/video/2024/04/10/milak-kristof-a-legjobb-idovel-ob-dontos-200-meter-pillangon
He was breathing through his nose at the end, wtf.
If you can be sure of anything from his first 1.5 days of racing — this guy did not take eight months off. I’m sure he enjoyed the articles about his old coach and the federation freaking out, while he was off training in Australia or Russia or his secret underground bunker.
the only news about him always was in the last months before february, that he was doing strength training with a strength coach (Gyorgy Zala, an olympic bronze medalist canoeist, and this coach was talking to the media), but no swimming. so if he indeed was swimming, it must have been mostly in Hungary for extended periods, and was a very well kept secret, as apparently even the swimming association was unaware of it.
If it was in Hungary it seems more likely the federation would have known about it.
He was training in Brisbane at least two months last autumn, if not longer.
people have been buzzing here about that and whether it’s true.. have any links or any other info? Just curious..
The rumour was only reported by Hungarian media so far, so it will only help if you understand the language.
https://index.hu/sport/uszas/2024/04/09/milak-kristof-hosszu-katinka-ob-uszas-duna-arena-ausztralia-brisbane/
It basically says they (the news agency) got an anonymous phone call from Brisbane claiming that Milak trained there for the better part of the fall of 2023. It’s pretty sketchy in my opinion – but at the same time, Kristof’s freestyle technique did appear to change.
He was training in an Endless Pool in his basement.