Boglarka Devai: I did not give up on the Olympics

Hungarian Boglarka Devai, the 2018 gold European medalist on vault, got injured last year when she hit the bar with her foot. A minor surgery was supposed to be followed by uneventful recovery and she was slated to compete at Worlds, but her wound got infected and required additional surgeries. She is still recovering now and will have to miss Worlds again, which will significantly lower her chances to qualify to Tokyo. As she isn’t a strong all-arounder, her only chance to qualify will be winning a spot at Apparatus World Cup Series, the same vault spot for which Jade Carey and Maria Paseka are competing.

Devai talked about her injury and the long and frustrating recovery process to Hungarian media. The two interviews were translated from Hungarian by Gergely Marosi.

Tibor Fábik of Magyar Nemzet talked to Devai about the injury:

Q: It’s almost September and your hometown World Challenge Cup event is coming up, do we see you there?

A: Competing – unfortunately surely not. I only started training two and a half months ago, after I’ve re-learned how to walk… Now I’m training on all four apparatuses, every day is a little tiny step forward, I can do basic acrobatics and that makes me happy.

Q: You are the second most successful active Hungarian artistic gymnast after Krisztián Berki, who’s also coming back from a long injury ordeal. It’s a bit surprising that your name is not in the news more often.

A: Sometimes I feel like a bit forgotten indeed, but Imre Draskóczy, the head coach of the WAG national team, regularly calls me and asks me about my wellbeing. Since I’m back to the gym, my coaches, Gábor Rácz and Erzsébet Vizer are sending videos of me to him.

Q: What happened to you?

A: It all started with a training. A month after the European Championships, I accidentally kicked into the lower bar of the uneven bars. This happens to everyone. But a tiny piece of bone splintered away from my left big toe. I went through various treatments, I had a minor surgery and in the meantime, the injury got infected. It was three days before travelling to the World Championships, and suddenly pus started oozing out. My foot got full of pus by the middle of my sole, I could not even get up! The injury I was treated for earlier was nothing compared to what followed. I went through two surgeries because of the infection. In January, I tried training again. But it did not work out. In March I was under the knife again, a joint was taken out from between two of my toe phalanges, because the infection completely destroyed it. It was fused with a 4 centimetre long screw.

Q: How can such a chain of events happen?

A: It’s a very good question who was at fault. I’ve changed hospitals since then, though… Eventually, my foot was treated well in Budapest, at the Semmelweis University Orthopaedic Clinic. I was really afraid that I would not be able to do elite sports again, or sports at all…

Q: Can you even plan your comeback?

A: My problem is such that full recovery is unpredictable. Two or three weeks ago I was having ankle pain, but my doctor said it is natural after such an injury, surgeries and rehabilitation. We don’t know whether this was the last of the pain or it will come back. I’d really love to come back and compete, the sooner the better, even if it’s a local event – but I don’t know when that time will come.

Q: Do you think your Tokyo participation chance is over?

A: I did not give up, because if I can make a full recovery in this year, I might stand a little chance. But I do not want to get ahead of myself. Three World Cup events early next year are qualifiers. In the bi-yearly period there are eight World Cups, only the best three results count, so I cannot make any mistakes – and then still, it would be really hard to get the spot.

Q: It’s not a usual thing how you bounced back from this.

A: It was not easy for sure, but I’ve been living in gymnastics for fifteen years, and if I want to reach a goal, I don’t let obstacles come before me. Through it all, I’ve tried to stay positive and think about the possible best outcome.

In another interview with Erika Kovács of Nemzeti Sport, Devai elaborated on her recovery:

Q: You said to me we can talk after the training – this sentence has two good news in one.

A: Yes, I’ve been back in the gym for ten weeks indeed.

Q: Can we go through what happened? Back last autumn, we’ve heard you suffered a minor left foot injury in training. What was next?

A: I went through a minor foot surgery and trained for the World Championships, while being in treatment. Somehow I’ve got an infection in the hospital. Three days before we were set to leave for the World Championships, my wound opened up. I was packed, but I was not going to Doha – I was going to the hospital instead.

Q: Your struggles were not over with this, though.

A: It was hard to take what happened, but I stayed patient and started to go down to the gym only in January. But these were more like feeble attempts – there was only one period when my foot could take training for a week or more. A specialist offered laser treatment. No change. And then a joint was taken out from between two of my toe phalanges, because the infection effectively destroyed it. The joint was fused, a screw installed, so now it’s stable but stiff.

Q: Did the thought of retirement cross your mind?

A: There were a lot of things crossing my mind during these nine months, but retirement was definitely not among them. In the autumn I was more like crying. In the spring I was more like defiant. I have been through some injuries earlier, but nothing of this length and magnitude. I told myself, I should be patient, I need time to heal.

Q: What happened ten weeks before?

A: I went to a hospital check-up and the doctor said that even though the bone healing is not hundred percent done, but very slowly I can start moving. Start running first, if my foot is not in pain, I can start to do minor jumps. Thank God, I did not have major pains.

Q: Did you get rid of your crutches completely?

A: Yes. During the autumn and the spring for about two months, I was only able to move around with crutches. With some black humour I always said I’m bringing my old friends…

Q: Where are you now in terms of preparedness?

A: I can do the basics on all four events.

Q: No pain?

A: I feel the weather changing. And the screw is protruding a bit, if you touch my skin there, you can feel it, so I need to be careful not to smash my foot into anything. I have to be more careful with a lot of things, I had to change the way of my running as well, because now my left big toe does not have dorsal flexion. There was minor pain in the ankle, but the doctor put my fears to rest and pointed out that in the first stage of recovery this happens often. Luckily, the pain went away in a week.

Q: The Olympic qualification World Championships are coming up in October, in Stuttgart.

A: I’m so much at the beginning of the road that I have no chance to make it. Two months is way too little. I had to put up with the fact, though because when this dawned on me, I was crying often at practices But it has passed. I’m doing my work in a much better mood now.

Q: How about Tokyo 2020?

A: I did not give up on the Olympics. If my foot is all right, I can obtain a nominative spot through the World Cup Series. Though in order to obtain it, I need to get such high scores that I should compete basically faultless. I don’t give up, but I am not chasing illusions either, because I don’t want to fall in despair yet again. I need to stay realistic and acknowledge: my rehabilitation process is unpredictable.

Q: Are you angry at somebody or something?

A: I don’t know who was at fault. Yes, I have anger. And because of the whole ordeal and the injury I had to take a year off from university studies as well.

Q: The main thing is that you can do gymnastics again – and of course staying patient.

A: Eh, everyone says that! It was terrible to sit at home for nine months and do nothing. Luckily my parents and coaches kept my spirit up and stood by me all the way through. I think this period made me tougher and I re-evaluated a lot of things. And I am not giving up.