Last weekend the youth team of Iron Swim Budapest competed at the 5th International Rheinfallmeeting in Switzerland. We have already reported on the team’s performance, our young swimmers collected many medals, now we have asked them about their experiences in Schaffhausen.
Experiences and lessons
‘We were at a beautiful place, and our hosts helped us a lot’ Lili Biró said. ‘The athmosphere of the competition was great, much more laid-back than the Nationals, but there were many lessons to learn, too. International competitions are useful, because we do not know the rivals which is an added challenge. We must focus more on our own race, since we do not know what to expect from the other competitors.”
‘Switzerland was very exciting, and the weather was very nice, too’ Benedek Bóna said. ‘I enjoyed travelling with the team. The competition also went well, we achieved good results. For me the biggest experience was to be part of this trip. And what did I learn? That it is difficult to swim backstroke in an outdoor pool. The sun almost blinded me.’
‘Probably the sightseeing had the biggest impact on me’ told Vladimir Krstulovic. ‘The whole city was beautiful, especially the waterfall. I think an international competition can give us useful experiences. I swam many events within a short time, we learnt how to compete in more difficult situations.’
‘I am the proudest of my 800 free, but everything was great in general’ smiled Richárd Juhász-Dóra. ‘Switzerland is awesome. Everyone performed well at the competition, we won several medals. But we have learnt that it is much more difficult to swim in an outdoor pool. The wind blew stronger and the sun was a distracting factor as well.’
‘Speaking about the nature we can say that we were at a gorgeous place. Switzerland is 90% green that is true for the whole country and we were fascinated by that’ explained Sándor Gerebics. ‘At the competition everything was precisely organized, we had nothing to complain about. We competed in many events, and that meant we had to focus more on recovery, food and relaxation. This kind of trip can be good to learn how to be independent and it teaches responsibility.
And the fun factor
‘This trip has given a lot from the team’s point of view. It brought us together, we got to know each other. We had a lot of fun’ Vlada said.
‘What was the best? The beautiful girls!’ responded Beni.
‘I think the funniest story of the trip was when I tried to make fun of a German lady while travelling back home by train, and sheturned out to be Hungarian. It was a bit embarrassing, but we laughed together’ said Ricsi.
‘We laughed a lot during the whole trip’ Sanyi started. ‘There was a 50 fly skins race, and we somehow forgot about it. I was the only participant from our team, and when I swam the first race, I thought it was the final. I finished second, got out of the water happily how well I performed. And then I saw the same guys standing on the starting block again. I was with my team and suddenly they told me to go back for the next race. I was absolutely shocked and in chaos. I did not understand anything. I had already taken off my cap and googles. The referees started to whistle, and I was running in my robe without cap and googles and shouting to wait for me. I was totally exhausted. The referee did not see me or did not want to see me, so he did not wait for me. I tried to put my cap on as quickly as I could, but I could not do it. I dropped it and jumped on the block as I was, and I jumped into the water immediately. Unfortunately, I could not qualify, although I was not far from it, I gave everything in the first race, so I had no more power. The others had fun, surely it was a funny and comical situation.’
And how the two girls could get on with the eight boys during the trip?
‘Well, surprisingly well’ Lili smiled.
