Reigning Olympic Champion Kristof Milak Withdraws From 2025 World Championships

Two-time Olympic champion Kristof Milak will not compete at the 2025 World Championships in Singapore.

Milak’s coach, Almos Szabo, revealed the superstar’s absence at the upcoming championships on Hungarian National Sports Radio, multiple local outlets have reported.

Szabo, who only began coaching Milak in late 2024, added that he didn’t believe Milak’s decision to opt out of Worlds was a bad one, given his lack of training and “motivation” this year.

“We discussed this. Kristof has indicated this intention, and I support him in this,” Szabo said, according to M4 Sport.

“Everyone should put their hand on their heart, there have been times when things didn’t go as planned, and this isn’t even the case here, because we didn’t start the year with 100% confidence that we would be competing in the World Championship.

“I don’t find anything wrong with Kristof not being there at the World Championships, many top athletes, especially those who are as successful as him, have already chosen this path.”

This marks the third consecutive World Championships (LC) that Milak won’t contest, as he withdrew from the 2023 Worlds in Fukuoka citing mental and physical fatigue.

Then, like many of the world’s top swimmers, he did not compete at the 2024 World Championships in Doha, which, in a unique circumstance, were held just five months before the Olympics.

“No one disputes his abilities, Kristof has a unique talent, the mental part is the hardest for him,” Szabo continued. “He needs rest, and only he will know when that certain flame will flare up. When it does, he will start at the world competitions and will probably be outstanding there.”

Szabo believes taking time off now gives Milak a chance to rekindle his passion for the sport leading up to the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.

“If he can’t find motivation in a world championship, he won’t stand up to the slap machine to come in third, for example, because if he starts, he’s fighting for the highest goals,” Szabo said. “According to our shared ideas, he still has a chance to break the world record in the two butterfly events, he has the knowledge to do so. We all feel the year after the Olympics on our skin, and it’s terribly difficult to find motivation at this time.”

Despite questions about his commitment to training surrounding him in the lead-up to the Olympics in Paris, Milak won gold in the men’s 100 butterfly in a time of 49.90, the second-fastest performance of his career, and he also claimed silver in the 200 fly. That performance flipped his results from the Tokyo Games in 2021, when he topped the 200 fly podium and earned silver in the 100 fly in a close battle with Caeleb Dressel.

At the 2025 Hungarian Nationals in early April, Milak showed solid form, winning the 100 free (48.76) and 200 fly (1:56.13) and finishing as the runner-up in the 50 fly (23.43) and 100 fly (50.67) to qualify for the World Championships. That swim in the 100 fly still ranks him 6th in the world this season.

He was committed to compete on the Mare Nostrum Tour last month before withdrawing.

This past February, Milak spoke openly on the MOL Pályán áját podcast, mentioning that he had considered quitting the sport.

In his last World Championship appearance in 2022, Milak won gold and broke the world record in the 200 fly racing on home soil in Budapest, and he completed the fly double by topping the 100 fly field in dominant fashion.

In Milak’s absence, the men’s 100 fly is looking relatively wide open at next month’s World Championships, with nine men (not including Milak) having broken 51 seconds this season, led by Switzerland’s Noe Ponti (50.27).

In the 200 fly, Leon Marchand, who topped Milak for Olympic gold last summer, remains the favorite despite having yet to race the event in long course this season, while American Luca Urlando leads the world rankings by over a second in 1:52.37.

Without Milak, Marchand figures to be the lone Olympic or world champion to race the 200 fly in Singapore (and his entry isn’t even confirmed), with 2024 world champion Tomoru Honda missing the Japanese team and two-time world champion and 2012 Olympic champion Chad Le Clos pulling out of the meet earlier this year.