Berlin, Day 2: Milak eyes 200m butterfly world record again while Morozov does a double

On a day that saw the first human break the two-hour barrier running the marathon, Hungary’s Kristoph Milak revealed that he also has his eyes on a world record prize. Like Eliud Kipchoge, Milak believes he can break boundaries.

In aquatic terms, that would be to go under the 1 minute and 50-second mark he set at the World Championships in Gwangju this summer in the men’s 200 metre butterfly, where he broke Michael Phelps’ previous world best time.

“Yes of course that is my plan,” said Milak when asked if the 200m fly would be his focus from now on. On setting new boundaries in the event he added: “I already did it. I think have 10 years [left in my career]. I think I could go under 1 minute 50.”

Of his win in Berlin with a time of 1.55.47 he said: “I swam clever, they pushed the first 100m too much. On the last 50 my experience helped, I knew I could win it. These competitions are practice for me with very highly skilled competitors, but my main goal is the times.”

Russia’s Vladimir Morozov took home two golds on the second day of the FINA Swimming World Cup fifth leg to move even closer to his goal of winning every race he enters in the tournament.

He added the men’s 50m backstroke and 100m freestyle to his 50m freestyle title he took on the first day, and hopes to keep the momentum going in the last cluster with Kazan and Doha left to go.

“It feels good, not just the freestyle race but the whole tournament, so I hope to keep it going and win every race of the World Cup, I’m not sure if anyone has done that before. The 50 back was really close; I think this one [100m freestyle] hurt the most but wasn’t as close.” Vladimir Morozov

Kira Toussaint took the title ahead of both Hosszu and Canada’s Taylor Ruck, and with it a personal best and national record for the Netherlands with a time of 59.46 seconds.

“It’s OK, I’m in heavy training so, obviously for Budapest I wanted to make sure I put on a show for the Hungarian crowd, but now it’s back to training and focusing on the long-term goals. This has shown in the 400 time that yes, I’m a bit more tired, but I’m happy with the time.” Katinka Hosszu

Florian Wellbrock finally got his win on home turf in the men’s 1500m, though not as comfortably as he would have liked, as the crowd helped him hold off repeated challenges from France’s David Aubrey and eventually Spain’s Albert Escrits, who finished two seconds behind and took silver.

“It was a close race today, closer than last week in Budapest,” he said. “Of course I love racing in Berlin. [The performance] wasn’t important today, the importance was the gold medal for me and nothing more.”

Czech Republic’s Barbora Seemanova added the women’s 200m freestyle title to her bow, tying in neatly with a win in the 400m freestyle on Friday. Jessica Vall Montero of Spain also took home her second gold of this leg, with a win in the 100m breaststroke having already secured the 200m on the first day.

Val Montero attributed her string of golds in Berlin to her move to becoming a full-time professional, with her last win in the German capital coming in 2014 when she was still studying and working in biomedicine alongside her swimming career.

Dutch sprint queen Ranomi Kromowidjojo finally got her gold here in Berlin taking the 50m butterfly crown, after losing out in both the 50m freestyle and 50m backstroke on the previous day. While Australian favourite Cate Campbell claimed silver, it proved a triple threat for bronze with the medal being shared between Germany’s Aliena Schmidtke, Denmark’s Emilie Beckmann and Sweden’s Michelle Coleman.

“Today I was really focusing on my own race and technique and that was a lot better than yesterday. I use these competitions for race strategy and training for the Olympics. There was strong competition with Cate and there were three bronze girls, so I think it’s really funny to medal with four other girls instead of two. It was a close field.” Ranomi Kromowidjojo

A few other surprises were also in store as Serbia’s Caba Siladi defeated Berlin’s 100m World Cup champion Arno Kamminga from the Netherlands in the 50m breaststroke, while Jeremy Desplanches of Switzerland did the same to Lithuania’s 400m freestyle champion Danas Rapsys in the men’s 200m individual medley.

The mixed 4x100m freestyle relay then looked to provide us with some more Hungarian champions until Sweden snatched the lead, only for Hosszu’s last leg surge to be in vain as Hanna Eriksson held on for Sweden’s eventual victory.