What's your take on how competitive the 100m and 200m butterfly fields are?
It's pretty [competitive] especially because there is Michael [Phelps] - I think he's one of the biggest fly swimmers - and Chad Le Clos, too. We can see Tom Shields wants to show us he is a really good flyer, too. That will be hard. For the 200m, maybe three or four people have a chance to get medals at the Olympics. In the 100m, maybe a little bit more. But I know those times I swam at the world champs will not be enough to get any medal at the Olympics.
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That would be your first gold medal.
Yes. That is the main reason I still continue swimming, because I have not won any gold medals yet. This is my biggest motivation to train every day.
[Three-time Hungarian Olympian] Katinka Hosszu said people in Hungary are a little critical if you don't have gold medals.
Yeah. People in Hungary want everyone to win a gold medal. If you don't do that, they say, oh it is terrible and a huge disappointment. Now they start to realize that it is not only the first place. There are some other achievements and races when people make the finals or get sixth place, it is wonderful, too. The gold is what everyone wants and everyone knows.
The gold is what everyone wants and everyone knows.
What would change for you at home based on what medals you bring home from Rio?
It doesn't going to change. I try my best. If I race and I feel I've done everything in the race, that's all I can do. I will be happy and satisfied. I won't care about what the others say. I try last time and if it's not working then I won't be so sad about that.
It seems like the competitors in the 100m and 200m butterfly are the most vocal about their results. There's a lot of trash talk going back and forth. Why?
Oh, I don't know. I'm not thinking about it too big trash talk. Sometimes we need to keep watching what we say. There was an unfortunate thing because at the world champs we swam with Chad and Michael swim at home in the nationals and that was a little bit different. It show us if Michael is not here, he is just training and racing and he's doing very good and great results. But every race is a little bit different. We can't make a compare with the world champs for a normal race. It is different, I think. I heard what Chad said. Maybe a little bit too harsh. You need to show I am not afraid of you and show I am very confident on myself. We will see what will happen but I think we need to fight only in the water.
When you see Michael or Chad in lanes next to you, what goes through your mind?
I don't need to keep looking for the competitors. I just keep looking and thinking about how I want to swim on those events or what I want to do in the water. I need to just keep focusing on that to get my best in the water.