Olympic champion David Popovici of Romania recently spoke to the media about his home nation’s lack of competitive conditions and premier training facilities.
Despite his success, collecting 200m free gold and 100m free bronze at last summer’s Olympic Games among his impressive achievements, Popovici described his relatively mediocre training conditions at the Lia Manoliu pool in the capital city of Bucharest as a plea for Romania to invest more in its athletes on multiple levels.
The freestyle ace stated recently on a podcast, “If I were to bring my opponents or friends from other countries to visit or train with me at ‘Lia Manoliu,’ they would say that I’m making fun of them. They would say, ‘it’s a joke, show us where you actually train.’
“I am convinced that they wouldn’t believe me.” (MCN Podcast)
“For 3-4 months a year, when it’s cold, an improvised dome is placed over the pool, and everyone coughs their lungs out because there is too much chlorine and there isn’t a very good ventilation system, considering that I don’t have a proper gym where I can train.
“You can’t get such a gym, no wonder it becomes a miracle to achieve sports performance in Romania. I am lucky that I can also train at Dinamo, at my club. Other swimmer friends of mine go to Bulgaria. It’s not normal, and I want to talk about this a lot,” said Popovici, during the MCN podcast hosted by Cosmin Nedelcu.
He continued, “That’s why I and very few athletes are in this position of champions in sports. We don’t have a real strategy for sports, we don’t have such a great interest from politicians in sports.”
Popovici also described the path that led him to coach Adrian Radulescu and his other resources.
“Just because my father searched a lot, I managed to gather a very good team, with a nutritionist from the United States, a video analyst from Belgium, and physical trainers from Romania.
“We somehow came together, but athletes should have them from a young age and be provided by the state, because you end up representing the state.”
As a nation, Romania collected nine medals in Paris, spanning the sports of swimming, rowing, weightlifting and gymnastics. That was a significant improvement from the 2020 Games in Tokyo where Romania brought home 4 medals in total from rowing and fencing.
At one time, Popovici had intended to study psychology at the University of Bucharest. Last year he decided to change course and put those plans on hold, saying “I wanted to try with college in the year of the Olympics to do both, but I saw that I couldn’t focus on training with college as much as I would have liked.”
Popovici to UVA! Time to join the huge incoming recruiting class!
You should see the pool Claudia and Silvia Poll trained in at Cariari in Costa Rica. It’s outdoors, unheated, and the pool temperature spends most of the year around 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Even though they’ve won all of Costa Rica’s Olympic medals (and their only gold), Costa Rica still does not have a state-of-the-art natatorium almost 30 years later.
I call BS. There is no way the pool is anywhere near that cold. The average temp in San Jose is 75-80 year round. It is idyllic weather. And the pool is at the Cariari Country Club in a very nice area. Doesn’t sound anything like what Popovici is dealing with.
Not to say their training facilities were tip top, but at least one of them tested positive for using performance enhancing drugs at USA Nationals in the early 2000’s.
With all the challenges, the taste of olympic achievement is sweeter…well done young man, well earned.
He’s been a world record holder and is now Olympic champion (despite these training limitations). Surely he has the resources to train in another country, right?
That’s the thing, he wants Romania to be that country where other swimmers think about this. Rather than Romanians themselves.
My interpretation is Popovici is not out for himself and looking to leave Romania. He is trying to improve the conditions of swimming and sports training and facilities within Romania. Did he say in the Podcast anywhere that he was considering leaving Romania?
as a true Stoic he preferes not to leave his comfort zone and try different environment
“We somehow came together, but athletes should have them from a young age and be provided by the state, because you end up representing the state.”
I agree, time to nationalize the NCAA
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I think he primarily trains at Dinamo though, though I guess Manoliu is the national team pool (?). He said he’s “lucky” he gets to train at Dinamo, so he didn’t state exactly what % of the time. He said these things right after the Olympics as well, and Dinamo was like “We just want to clarify that we offer him great conditions” and he said “Yes, I was more talking about general conditions for swimmers.” (Awkwardness.)
Its kind of like Gary Hall Sr training in the afternoons at the Disneyland resort pool until Flip Darr got a facility at Golden West. Yup, Hall did that since the workouts in the morning at the high school pool was not enough. So Darr gave him a work out and he train in the afternoons at the Disneyland resort pool.
Think of the drama it would cause if he represented Hungary and said this. 😂
Like Romania is any better in that regard. The countries of Middle Europe and the Balkans are all very touchy about national pride (annoying, but understandable given the history).
Also, if he ever wants to win a relay gold, Hungary is happy to have him xd.
Have you been to Hungary? Have you seen the facilities? Not just the world class Duna Arena but practically every village has a 50m pool. Most larger towns have facilities that rival any US College. Why would he say this if he was Hungarian. It wouldn’t cause drama it would be laughable. Just like your comment.
Defensive nationalism in response to a joke/jab towards Milak-critics? Gotcha.
No you didn’t get me. Normally a joke succeeds in the humor department. You’re just slagging off Hungary and a system that provides huge support for swimmers even if they couldn’t be bothered to turn up, not for the work they get paid for, not for the fans who support them. No I don’t work for the Hungarian swimming federation but this woke crap tolerating bad behavior from an icon and huge talent is a massive problem if you want to have any future for sport. Get your kicks somewhere else. If you love swimming then stop looking for excuses and hammering those trying to protect and develop the sport.
the joke has gone way over your head man. chill
The ‘we pay you so we can buy your entire life’ mindset is exactly what is wrong with the Hungarian Swimming Federation (and you). Milak is financially supported to perform at swimming competitions and he did. He did it better than any other active Hungarian swimmers. It’s too much for the federation to want to control where and when he shows up and with whom he chooses to train, especially when he was going through serious mental struggles. You have to treat a human like a human. Did US Swimming ever check Dressel’s attendance in the past two years? Did Aquatics GB ever check Peaty’s? The word support doesn’t only involve money.
And, it’s not like the amount of… Read more »
A lot of natural springs too.