In April, we saw Olympic champion Kristof Milak back in action at the Hungarian National Championships. The last time we saw him was one year ago, at the Hungarian National Championships; since then he has missed the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka and Doha respectively.
Milak won five golds and a silver at the Hungarian Championships, but he was far off his personal bests.
The last year’s Hungarian Nationals finished on 22 April 2023, and this was the last time in 2023 that the Olympic, World and European champion Kristof Milak was seen.
There was a great silence around him; Milak declared that he needed a rest and would miss the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka and would definitely not defend the World title he won in 2022 with a World Record in his home pool in the Duna Arena. Milak has been resting – a lot, as no one has seen him around the pools.
He has started to train again in September 2023, but after a while he moved away from pool training again, only Gyorgy Zala was around him, as a strength and conditioning coach. The world record holder did not participate in competitions, he lived and trained in isolation from the media and the public, with almost no one knowing about Milak's condition.
This February | Milak Returns to the Pool
The news has been reported that Kristof Milak returned to the pool and started to participate in pool training in the last week of February 2024. His coach Balazs Virth said after the first week of training that Milak was in better shape than he had expected. We need to underline that Gyorgy Zala and Milak have been training a lot on dryland, which was evident at the Nationls in April, as he had a spindly and muscular body.
He spent 3 weeks in a training camp in Tenerife in March with Boglarka Kapas, David Verraszto, Richard Marton, Adam Telegdy and Gabor Zombori, and according to his coach Balazs Virth, Milak did an excellent job. The team and the isolation had a good effect on the Olympic champion, as he didn't miss a single training session during the training camp, working hard both in the pool and on dryland.
Five Golds and a Silver Off Six Weeks of Training
Kristof Milak proved again to be a truly special talent at the Hungarian National Championships. It was already known that Milak is way better in competitions than during training. He handles the stress factors well, and during the meets, he can give an incredible performance, often surprising even his coaches. This happened at the Hungarian national championships as well.
During the four days of competition, the Olympic champion swam a total of six events. He won five of them. On the first day, Milak stunned everyone in the 100m freestyle with a confident 48.38 to win ahead of Nandor Nemeth, who won the bronze medal at the World Championships in Doha, in February.
On the second day, Milak swam the 200m butterfly and 50m freestyle, winning the 200m butterfly smoothly with a time of 01:54.90. To clarify, this time would have put him third in Doha, but we haven't seen such a slow time from him in the afternoon since 2018, with his slowest ever Hungarian Championships winning time being 1:53.6. However, he smashed the 50m freestyle - Milak came in 21.89, so he only had 25 minutes to rest after the 200m butterfly, with the medal ceremony. In the 200m butterfly, his split times were well short of his PB, the World Record - 24.91/29.37 and 30.62/30.00, respectively - 4.56 seconds off his personal best, the current world record.
Only in the 50m butterfly Milák did not win gold, where he was beaten by Szebasztian Szabo, who was 12 hundredths off the first place (23.44).
Mic Drop | Milak Did Not Gave a Single Interview
What Milak's thoughts were about his performance and his return, we do not know, as he didn’t give any interview to anyone, not even to his teammates, about his swimming.
However, Balazs Virth, Milak's coach, told us that even he did not expect such great results from the Olympic champion: “He swam a way better than I thought. This is surprising for me, but also encouraging." He added: "In the 50m free, it was his PB; in the 100m free, it was one and a half seconds off his PB; and in the 200m fly and free, it was 3-4 seconds off. That pretty much gives you the picture back of what work has been done in terms of strength development, and the sprint events are going well. He still needs to improve his stamina; it's understandable because he missed almost a year."
Do Not Try To Copy Him
Virth said that no one should try to copy him; this should not be shown as an example, as Milak is an exceptional talent, this is extremely unique: "Swimming requires such special training that it doesn't fit for everyone." Virth added that other athletes to not try and copy him, as Milak's unique technique and talent can hide the lack of training.
It’s safe to say that Kristof Milak is back, but the question is how he will prepare for the Olympics. He has been named for the European Championships in the Hungarian National Team and certainly will compete in the 50-100m and 200m butterfly and 50m freestyle, and if he wants, he will also swim the 100m and 200m freestyle in Belgrade from 17-23 June.