Boglarka Kapas: “No One Is In Shape Right Now” & More Post-4 Nations Meet

4 NATIONS MEET

• Friday, July 24th – Sunday, July 26th
• Széchy Swimming Arena, Budapest
• 50m (LCM)
• Day 1 Prelims/Day 1 Finals/Day 2 Finals/Day 3 Finals
• Results

The 4 Nations Meet wrapped up in Budapest where we saw some stellar performances by racers stemming from the host nation, Austria, Czech Republic, and Poland.

We documented how 17-year-old Hubert Kos broke onto the scene with a big-time IM double of 4:15.77 in the 400m and 1:59.06 in the 200m to blast away his previous lifetime bests.

Additionally, Austrian Felix Auboeck set a new national record in the 200m free as Hungary’s Kristof Milak wrapped up the trifecta of butterfly factories across the 50m/100m/200m distances.

Refresh yourself on the swims via the recap links above and then let’s hear from some of the Hungarian highlight reel-worthy stars as they take stock of their first intentional competition post-coronavirus-pandemic lockdown.

Katinka Hosszu

• “In February, I swam 4:37 with my leg cramping after a 1,500 fast – that’s about the difference between myself then and now. It’s not very easy now, I’ve always existed with everything calculated, competitions, including workouts, and now this is the first competition after a very long time, and who knows when it will be next. But at least some nice memories came back, since the last time I swam here on the island in 2010.”
• “It was important that we could finally compete, even if now the performances, the times didn’t matter so much, in fact, not really at all, now the focus was on racing. Obviously, it’s not easy to deal with the Tokyo postponement. We’re here on the island, in a four-nation race – but because of the circumstances, that’s also to be greatly appreciated, and so, after all, there are many beautiful memories of this pool.

Kristof Milak

• Regarding his 100m free, “I didn’t want to swim that fast two times, but now I don’t mind so much that I did that way. I made a bunch of mistakes, but somehow it worked.”
• On his 200m fly, “I didn’t push my first 50m [of the 200m fly] as much as usual. The middle two 50s were fine, but the last one I died.”
• “I am very satisfied because I was able to improve in all of my races. I am inspired by this meet and it’s important we’ve finally been able to push ourselves against foreigners for the past 3 days instead of just competing against each other.”

Boglarka Kapas

• “Obviously no one is in shape now, neither am I. I always just look at myself and measure my performance against myself. In the present situation, within 2 seconds of my best time is good.”

Hubert Kos

• “I was actually preparing for this 200m IM for 6 months now. I had expected it to explode about now, less so the 400m IM, but that also went well. I’m lucky because we have a pool at home and I only missed a total of 3 days because of quarantine. So, unlike the others, I’m already looking forward to a little rest.”

Akos Kalmar

• “I’m glad that I finally managed to swim within 15 minutes [in the 1500m free]. I think I am in a very good place in Veszprém now. We are really pulling each other, me and Kristóf Rasovszky.”

All quotes courtesy of the Hungarian Swimming Association.