There were people who predicted Márton Viviana's gold medal for more than two weeks

One of the most unexpected Hungarian Olympic gold medals of all time was won by Márton Viviana on Friday in Paris, in the taekwondo 67 kg weight group.

Unexpectedly, Károly Varga's victory in the small-barreled sports rifle in Moscow can only be compared to that of the 18-year-old Hungarian girl born in Tenerife. Let us guess, because the American magazine Sports Illustrated already predicted Márton Viviana's gold medal more than two weeks ago.

For decades, Sports Illustrated has regularly asked Brian Cazeneuve to predict the medal winners of the upcoming Summer or Winter Olympics in each event. The glossy American magazine's prediction for the Paris Games was published on July 24, well before the opening, when nothing was known about how the odds would pan out.

Of course, the guesses already went here, all of our future champions were mentioned among the golden chances, from Kristóf Milák through Hubert Kós and Kristóf Rasovszky to the men's dueling team, but of course the name of Áron Szilágyi and the women's fencers, the water polo players and the hammer thrower Bence Halász were also mentioned.

However, we forgot about one person: Márton Viviana, the 18-year-old taekwondo player born in Tenerife and living in Madrid, who stood on the top of the Olympic podium in the Grand Palais on Friday evening after the 67 kg weight group.

Or not? Sports Illustrated expert Brian Cazeneuve predicted the following order for women's taekwondo:

WOMEN'S 57 KG

Gold: Viviana Márton (Hungary)
Silver: Luo Zongshi (China)
Bronze: Lo Chia-ling (Taiwan)
Bronze: Hatice Kübra İlgün (Turkiye)

A small problem is that Cazeneuve's colleague most likely confused Viviana with her twin sister, Luana, competing in the 57 kg category, who really had a chance, as she won the world championship title last year, but did not make it to the Olympics. In addition, the Márton twins do not compete in the same weight group, so that they do not have to fight against each other: Viviana went up to 67 kilos and won the Olympic championship there.

It is noteworthy that the Sports Illustrated writer did not feel in the wrong place even in the 67 kilos category, as he predicted the following for the podium:

WOMEN'S 67 KG

Gold: Julyana Al-Sadeq (Jordan)
Silver: Magda Wiet-Hénin (France)
Bronze: Ruth Gbagbi (Ivory Coast)
Bronze: Caroline Santos (Brazil)

By the way, Márton's twin sister, Luana, who is also the champion's training partner, was - and still is - in Paris with Viviana.

 

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A post shared by Team Hungary – Hungarian Olympic Team (@olympicteamhungary).

Marca also published a cute parallel video interview about the always smiling, hyperactive twins according to their coaches.

How sensational Márton Viviana's victory was is evidenced by the fact that she was only seeded 12th before the competitions.

After winning the final, the Hungarian gold medalist ran around the tatami with two flags: the Hungarian one, of course, and another one, which included both yellow and blue in its color combination. On the website gyakorikerdesek.hu, an ill-informed reader even asked why Viviana was waving the Ukrainian flag.

Well, this time the two colors did not refer to Ukraine, mainly because the third color was white on the flag, which is also the flag of the Canary Islands.

The Márton twins were born in Tenerife 18 years ago and paid tribute to their birthplace with this beautiful gesture.

 

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A post shared by MARCA (@marca).

One more interesting piece of information: the two taekwondo twins, Viviana and Luana, are the grandsons of the legendary boxing coach and club owner, Zoltán Kiss alias Totó, the boss of Totó Box Promotion!

Viviana and Luana are considered Gemelas de Oro at their club in Madrid, and as one of their coaches, Jesús Ramal, recalled, at the time they appeared as they did, bursting into the gym like an earthquake.

By the way, the coaches of the Madrid club were on a recruitment drive in Tenerife, they held an open day, and the twins were immediately absorbed by the sport. Despite the fact that they had previously tried swimming, horse riding, rhythmic gymnastics and athletics, they had so much energy that their parents took them to sports anyway.

There was something special about them, even though they were so small that they didn't even reach my waist, says Ramal. "But there was some kind of holy madness in their eyes, some kind of determination that I've never seen in anyone else."

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Featured image: Gold medalist Márton Viviana (l) and her Finnish coach Suvi Maarika Mikkonen during the final of the women's taekwondo 67 kilogram event at the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics at the Grand Palais exhibition hall on August 9, 2024. MTI/Zsolt Czeglédi