Already a World Champion, Hubert Kos Prepared to Take Next Step in Paris
Bob Bowman, ever the statesman, was ready with a deflection. The 2023 World Aquatics Championships were about to wrap up in Fukuoka, Japan. The coach fielded questions about his work with Team USA and his tutelage of Leon Marchand, but he made sure there was time to mention one other notable swimmer. And when it came time to ascribe credit for the world title won days earlier by Hubert Kos, Bowman already knew where he would draw the line between the influence of six months in Arizona and a life of swimming in Hungary.
“I just helped a little bit at the end,” Bowman said. “What we did improve on Hubi is his technical skills around the walls, underwaters. Also I think swimming in the collegiate season, he got a better idea of what speed is like and how to manage that.
“He just works very, very hard, so it’s easy to help him get better. When he’s competing with all those other guys in practice, it just raises his level.”
Swim diplomacy aside, Bowman presents a strong case on Kos. In a world where Marchand wasn’t the best male swimmer in the world, Kos’ case would be a special one: two seasons lighting up NCAA competition for Arizona State around a World Championship gold in the men’s 200 backstroke.
He might add an Olympic medal when Paris rolls around this summer. But he’s doing it all while perhaps still flying under the radar. The Marchand effect contributes, but so does the soft-spoken journey of the Telki native, one that might well culminate on an Olympic podium.
INTO THE DESERT
Hubert Kos’ introduction to global swimming came before his arrival in Tempe, but three semesters at Arizona State catapulted a promising young swimmer to medal-contender status.
Kos has been a known international commodity since he was 16 years old, representing Hungary at the European Youth Olympic Festival in 2019, then the World Junior Championships that year. His results at the latter were encouraging, though more a reflection that a swimmer born in 2003 was swimming a bunch of 2001 birth years—his nearest brushes with a final came from finishing ninth in the 400 individual medley and 10th in the 200 IM, with backstroke finishes in the 20s.
Kos made the time away from competition during the COVID-19 pandemic work, as he showed at the 2020 European Championships (which were actually swum a year later in 2021). His time of 1:56.99 in the 200 IM from semifinals sliced 7-hundredths off Qin Haiyang’s world junior record from 2017. In his first Euros, Kos did it alongside Hungarian legend Laszlo Cseh, who was competing in his 10th—a poignant passing of the Hungarian IM torch that has long been the program’s cornerstone.
Kos didn’t back that swim with significant results at his next major meets. At the Tokyo Olympics, he finished 20th in the 200 IM—some 1.5 seconds shy of his world junior mark—and swam on a Hungarian medley relay that didn’t escape prelims. The 2022 World Championships in Budapest left him 12th in the 400 IM and sixth in the 200 IM, the latter more than two seconds behind eventual teammate Leon Marchand.
But none of that tempered expectations for what Arizona State was getting in assembling a national-title contender. Instead, it emphasized just how promising the pieces would be with Kos if he could figure out ways to put them together with consistency.
A FAST THREE SEMESTERS
Kos’ ASU career didn’t officially begin until January of 2023, which makes his stay in NCAA swimming seem all the more impactful.
By that point, Marchand had established himself as a college world-beater. Around him, pieces were coalescing for Bowman’s Sun Devils to assault the record books and topple the duopoly of California and Texas.
It didn’t happen immediately. Kos did his part in 2023, finishing third at NCAAs in the 200 back, fourth in the 400 IM and 11th in the 200 IM. He had been just 10th in the latter event at Pac-12s.
The quantum leap came after that season in Fukuoka, Kos pulling a shocker in finals to drop to 1:54.14, a Hungarian record, and beat American Ryan Murphy by nearly 7-tenths in the men’s 200 backstroke.
It was a validation, if one was needed, of the work he and Bowman had done. After so much focus on the IM, he ended up nearly nine seconds quicker in the 200 back than three years prior—a direct credit, Kos said, to his training environment.
“I went out to Arizona State to focus on my IM because the IM group there is kind of good,” Kos said. “When I got there, we were getting ready for the 2 IM, and it was really good working with Leon and Chase (Kalisz), and I felt like I was getting really good on that. But leading up to one of the TYR Pro Series at Westmont, Bob said, let’s try the 2 back, let’s try to qualify for that. And I swam a really good time.
“That’s the time that was the best time in the world, (1:)55.9. That was a really good swim, I thought. There was a couple of mistakes in there that I knew I could fix, but I think that was the moment that I knew that I was going to swim it at Worlds and really focus on it.”
Kos rode the wave back to Arizona State for a stellar sophomore season. At the Pac-12 Championships, he was third in the 200 IM, third in the 200 back and fourth in the 100 back to help the Sun Devils repeat as champions, albeit against a depleted Cal squad. A full-strength Cal couldn’t top ASU at NCAAs. Kos did his part, finishing second in the 200 back to Destin Lasco, fourth in a big swim in the 100 back and third in the 200 IM, with teammate Owen McDonald second.
A MOMENT IN TIME
Perhaps Jonny Kulow described it best as the 2024 NCAA Championships wound down, even more so given how fleeting it all would look just 48 hours later.
Kulow was at the podium at the IU Natatorium after Arizona State had won the men’s 400 medley relay. Kulow sat at the dais with his megawatt smile and his Lander, Wyoming, self-deprecation. After declaring himself “the least qualified” of his relay mates, he described what it was like to be on a relay with three swimmers who will have sealed their Olympic spots long before Kulow would battle for his at the U.S. Olympic Trials. One was Marchand, world record holder, all-conquering home-country hope, not with the group for this particular press briefing. One was Ilya Kharun, a silver medalist at the World Short Course Championships in the 100 fly. And the other was Kos.
So being the fourth guy on that team felt like…?
“I’d say it’s a double-edged blade,” Kulow said. “I’d say I’m definitely the least qualified out of these three to be on that relay. But it’s like a blanket. They’re a life vest…a get-out-of-jail-free card.”
Stream of metaphors aside, it applied more than Kulow would know. Saturday night, Arizona State was celebrating a title. By Monday, Bowman had been hired at Texas, setting off a slow-motion domino effect, the full ramifications of which won’t fully settle until after Paris.
Kos has followed Bowman to Austin. Whether or not they will ever replicate a moment like Indy there remains to be seen. But for that moment, Kos and his fellow Sun Devils had authored something special, something they had strived for for years.
It isn’t the first special moment Kos and Bowman have created for each other. And they’re betting it won’t be the last.
“We all knew coming into this meet that it was going to be a roller coaster,” Kos said then. “We were going to have tough moments, hard moments, but also happy ones. I think we’ve found this good mix of trying to do what we can do and what we can do best and not focus on the noise, not focus on anyone else and just live in that little moment we have.”
