Hungarian athlete defeats cancer, now prepares for the World Cup

He had to deal with serious problems, but Bálint Szeles returned to racing again. The 23-year-old athlete found out in a screening test in November 2019, before the start of the Covid-19 epidemic, that he had cancer. One of the athlete’s kidneys had to be removed two years ago, and he lost nine kilograms in just a few weeks, so he was completely weakened and could only start rebuilding his career again from there onwards.

National record after cancer

The story of the athlete turned out fortunate: he defeated cancer and started competing again, and he even set serious goals for himself: in 60-metre hurdles, Szeles aims to break the previous national record, set by Balázs Baji, says blikk.hu. The hurdler is amazingly proud to have completed the entry level of the Belgrade Indoor Athletics World Championships, greatly improving his previous personal best.

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Work with faith

“I could not control myself, but I did not intend to because running strengthened my belief in hard work and that the quantity and quality of my training were adequate. I was also surprised at how I was able to improve my 7.88 personal best first to 7.75 and then to 7.69 seconds.

I was incredibly happy, but I stay on the ground with both feet. I’m not slowing down my pace, I work with faith and great devotion because I want to get nice gifts from athletics,” said Bálint Szeles, according to atletika.hu.

From Eger

Bálint Szeles started his university studies in his hometown of Eger and is now preparing for his sports economics studies in the eastern Hungarian town of Debrecen.

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He has already won silver and bronze medals in the colours of the Eger Városi Sportklub (Eger City Sports Club) on 110m hurdles at the Hungarian open-air national championship, and he was able to celebrate a Super League victory last year as well.

After the retirement of the world champion bronze medalist and the second-place winner of the European Championships, Balázs Baji is expected to have another big battle here with Valdó Szűcs from Debrecen, who actually spends most of the year in the United States, preparing there and only flying home for the races. He will do so for the winter national championships on February 26-27, which means more of a home advantage for Bálint Szeles this time.

Bálint Szeles tried high jumping at first, back then, he considered hurdles just a hobby. But when he won a gold medal at the age of 17 in the national championship, he switched from high jump to hurdles.