It took a real team and individual perseverance to achieve the Szabadics's sporting success

With a strong focus on community-building programmes, Szabadics Zrt. launched a team of 13 people in Hungary's largest community running race, the NN Ultrabalaton.

2024 marks the 18th edition of Hungary's most popular community sporting event. The one-lap race around Lake Balaton is also the most popular running race in Central Europe, which can be run individually, in relay, by foot or by bike. The task is to go around the largest lake in Hungary, starting from the race centre in Balatonfüred and heading west. The relay teams will follow the runners in cars and everyone will join in at the beginning of the pre-assigned stage.

An ultra running race of over 200 kilometres was the dream of the founders in 2007, with a total of 200 participants at the start. Each year, more and more runners joined the handful of teams, and by 2023, the number of runners had exceeded 21,000. A larger team can complete the race in 27 hours and an individual in 31 hours.

The competitive spirit of Szabadics's staff is reflected in the fact that the Szabadics RUN team, which started on Saturday 4 May at 13:00, had the largest possible field of 13 participants, including four members of the Board of Directors: Szabadics Roland, Chief Operating Officer, Zoltán László, Director of Strategic Markets, Dr. Czigányné Bauer Beáta, CFO, and Ignác Varga, Director of the Building Construction Division, also took part in the challenging task.

First on UB

"Last autumn, we entered the UB for the first time, in the team competition category, in teams of 6-13 people. Around January 2024, we received the welcome news that we could enter the 'competition', we were on the waiting list"

- said Szabadics Roland, adding, "I put the race in quotes because as first timers, participation and performance were the most important things for us." Nevertheless, they had - of course - planned the required time, which they managed to exceed.

Team-building events are particularly important today, and the Szabadics Group also places great emphasis on such activities; sport plays a central role in the life of the company. „We support numerous sports competitions and sports clubs. Many of us are involved in sports, and we operate a gym with our own trainer for our colleagues in the office building. For years, we have been organising Hungary's largest corporate cycling team competition, the Szabadics Ride Company Challenget. UB perfectly reflects our philosophy: TOGETHER WE CAN SUCCEED!”

Ready team

They started their team with the largest possible number of runners, thus strengthening their position, but also their security, as the members included experienced runners, hobby runners and those who got more enthusiastic about running with this race.

"We were at different levels of preparedness, but - enthused Szabadics Roland - after the 'frame' was announced, everyone started their training plan with great enthusiasm, and I was happy to be able to include some runs together."

After the final registration, they had joint meetings to agree on the stage schedule, the updates, the logistics and even the jersey selection - so it was a real team effort to prepare.

Better than expected result

"It's been a day, but I'm still under the influence of the race; but it's not just me: the whole team is still in the absolute positive flow feeling"

- we learned from the Operations Director after the event.

Their result was 19 hours 18 minutes, which was an improvement on their original time and placed them in the top 20% in the company teams, and in the top 15% in the men's 10-13 teams (including 5 women). As he said:

"although I have said before that the time result doesn't matter, as a perfectionist company, everyone gave their best, many of them performed above expectations"

A huge challenge, a lasting experience

"Staying awake for 24 to 28 hours is stressful in itself, not to mention competing, running and travelling all the time," the director concluded. "It was a tiring mission, but with well-planned logistics, shifts, refreshments and bike escorts in the dark, we managed to complete the 20 hours or so without any problems, so that at the end we were tired but very happy to toast our success."

"I'm immensely proud of the whole team," he said, "and I thank the runners and all the helpers without whom this achievement would not have been possible. This event is a good symbol of the values that we at the Szabadics Group of Companies share:

We can only achieve results and success by helping each other and working together. Alone, no one could have achieved the goal; but together, working together, with everyone contributing their part, we did."