The University of Debrecen was represented in Tokyo at the Summer Olympic Games by Dóra Bodonyi in kayak, Anna Olasz in open water swimming, and Luca Kozák, Réka Szilágyi and Norbert Rivasz-Tóth in athletics.
On the last but one day of the competitions, the women’s kayak four, consisting of Dóra Bodonyi, Danuta Kozák, Tamara Csipes and Anna Kárász, claimed the gold medal and became Olympic champions in the 500m event. Dóra Bodonyi, a student at the Szolnok Campus of the University of Debrecen, had also scored a third place and a bronze medal in the women’s kayak double earlier.
Fotó: MTI Kovács Tamás
Fotó: MTI Kovács Tamás
European Championship silver medalist Anna Olasz, a student at the Faculty of Economics and Business, ended up mere seconds from the podium and scored a fourth place in women’s 10-kilometer open water swimming event. This has been the best Olympic result of the 27-year-old athlete so far: she had been the 14th in the same event in Rio de Janeiro before.
Fotó: MTI Tumbász Hédi
Among the Olympic athletes from the University of Debrecen, it was hurdle jumper Luca Kozák who competed first. She, by the way, graduated as a chemist last year and, at present, continues her studies as an accounting major at UD. In the 100m hurdles, she could not make it past the finish line because she lost her balance midway and hit the seventh hurdle.
Javelin thrower Réka Szilágyi was ranked 25th in the qualifying rounds, and she did not make it to the finals. She could go to the Olympics after winning the Hungarian championship in June, and her ranking in the world list granted her entry to Tokyo. A multiple contender at European, world and Universiade competitions, Réka is also a student at the Faculty of Law of the University of Debrecen.
Norbert Rivasz-Tóth, who is also a javelin thrower and studies at the Faculty of Law, did not make it to the finals either. His overall results put him to the 22nd place, wrote MTI, the Hungarian news agency.
“Everybody would be happy if he or she could be among the top ten or twenty practitioners in their own profession or occupation in the world. A lot of us tend to notice and appreciate only the medals, forgetting about the fact that, in order to be among the best in the world, a huge amount of hard work and effort is necessary. So, it makes us even more appreciative and proud that these excellent athletes could fit studies into their tight schedule, showing us that academic activities and sports can indeed be successfully combined and harmonized,” said László Balogh, the Director of Sports Science Coordination Institute at the University of Debrecen, appraising the achievements of our student athletes.
Yet, it is not just him but our entire university that can be rightly proud of them!
Press Office
