Pushing his limits: Medical student Matthew Marquardt goes for the podium at the Ironman World Championship

First place at 2025 Ironman Cairns. First place at 2025 Ironman Lake Placid. Fourth place in the 2024 Ironman Pro Series (and second place in the series so far in 2025).

If this sounds like the résumé of one of the world’s top professional triathletes, that’s because it is.

Photo courtesy of Matthew Marquardt

It’s also the résumé of third-year medical student Matthew Marquardt, who juggles 25 hours a week of Ironman training (swimming, biking, and running) with 50 to 60 hours a week at The Ohio State University College of Medicine, in Columbus.

This fall he will continue the clinical rotations he began in January, after taking a pause in medical school this summer, and during the 2024 calendar year, to research the use of custom anatomic 3D models in patients undergoing cancer surgery; the results of his research were published this month in the journal Oral Oncology.

Marquardt plans to become a surgeon specializing in head and neck cancers, one of the most highly competitive specialties in medicine.

But then, Marquardt is no stranger to competition, or to hard work.

Growing up in Cincinnati, Marquardt pursued five sports in high school: swimming, soccer, lacrosse, track, and cross-country, all while balancing Advanced Placement courses and high-level academics. He then attended Princeton University, where he swam and majored in chemistry.

“The reason I got into triathlon was actually because COVID canceled my senior year of swimming, and we weren’t allowed back on campus for the fall. So, for the first time in my life, over winter break, I didn’t have any commitments: no school and no swimming. At that point, I had already been accepted into medical school, so I could do whatever I wanted.”

Never one to choose a modest goal, Marquardt decided to bicycle across the country — leaving San Diego on December 30, 2020, and touching down in Jacksonville, Florida, 20 days later, all while raising money for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital. He then promptly signed up for a half Ironman — Ironman Gulf Coast 70.3 — which was held the day before his college graduation. The race went very well — Marquardt came in second in his age group and fourth overall, earning him an invitation to the Ironman 70.3 World Championship, held in October 2021 in St. George, Utah.

“I was thinking, that will be six weeks into medical school, I’ll get to have 70.3 World Championship on my résumé, and then I’ll be done, I’ll just be a medical student,” Marquardt recalls.

But then he ended up second in his age group at the World Championship, and not too far from the pros.

“At that point, I had this big decision to make. Do I go and just be a med student and do all the normal med student things, or do I take a chance and really kind of commit to triathlon? I talked to a ton of people — mentors, people within medicine — and time and time again, they told me that only one thing has been found to be predictive of future success in medicine. It’s not research, it’s not grades, it’s not letters of recommendation, it’s ‘Have you been exceptional at something else?’”

Photo courtesy of Matthew Marquardt

That was three years ago, and Marquardt has steadily been becoming exceptional in both triathlon and medicine. He turned pro in 2023, during his second year of medical school, then decided to take a research year after his preclinical years to dive more deeply into developing innovative 3D-printed surgical guides and models for patients undergoing treatment for head and neck cancers.

Marquardt admits that balancing medicine and high-level athletics isn’t always easy — and he admittedly doesn’t have much downtime — but maximizing his time is a skill he has honed since high school. “There’s all these little things, like I live two blocks away from medical school, so I can walk or bike [there] and I don’t have to worry about parking or the commute,” he says. “My bike trainer is here [in my apartment], there’s a treadmill in the med school basement, and the pool is a three-minute bike away.”

During the first two years of preclinical training, Marquardt would optimize his schedule to fit in workouts between meetings or to study between workouts.

The third year of medical school has been a bit more challenging, as he now must fit in workouts before and after work.

A typical day? Marquardt gets up at about 4 a.m. and starts his first workout of the day by 4:30, finishing up by about 6:30 so he can be at the hospital by 7. After getting off work between 3 and 6 p.m., depending on the day, he then completes his second workout of the day, eats dinner, and hangs out with his girlfriend, Sarah, who just started her first year of residency in med-peds (combined internal medicine and pediatrics) at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. Marquardt goes to bed by 7:30 or 8. All told, it’s about 50 to 60 hours of work, plus three to four hours of triathlon training on the weekdays, and five to six hours of training on Saturdays and Sundays.

“Yes, triathlon is hard. Yes, medical school is hard. But at the end of the day, I don’t think that I would do it any other way, because triathlon very much provides me with both an escape and an opportunity to recharge from medicine. And medicine provides me with an opportunity to recharge and escape from triathlon,” he says. “Medicine, in particular, provides a greater purpose than triathlon, and it also provides a lot more perspective on what’s actually important in life.”

Part of that perspective stems from watching a childhood friend go through treatment for cancer in high school. He has had other friends and mentors face cancer as well. Today, in addition to his research into head and neck cancers, Marquardt donates a portion of his prize money from triathlon to Pelotonia, an annual bike ride and community event in Columbus that raises money for The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center — Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute. Over the past three years, Marquardt has raised more than $26,000 for cancer research.

Photo courtesy of Matthew Marquardt

“I really believe that sport provides this incredible opportunity to make a positive difference in the world,” Marquardt says. “The goal has always been to get where I am now, where I have a platform I can use to inspire people to try triathlon or do a 5K but also to give cancer patients and families who have a loved one undergoing cancer treatment, to give them hope and for them to know that there are people outside of their care team thinking about them, people who are working toward the next generation of therapies and treatments.”

He recalls a recent request from a fellow triathlete and cancer patient, who had been diagnosed with a glioblastoma and had a massive stroke. “I don't think that I'm ever going to be able to race again,” the patient wrote to Marquardt. “Would you be willing to put my initials on your bike so that I can be at a world championship?”

“It is those interactions that drive me, day to day, and I feel so privileged that I’m at this point where I can do that,” he says.

So, what’s next for Marquardt? He’s in the final stages of training for the 2025 Ironman World Championship, to be held in Nice, France, on September 14. Then it’s back to school, where he will start a rotation in internal medicine.

Does he see himself having to give up triathlon at some point? “Throughout medical school, there are all these different gateways and checkpoints”: preclinicals, clinicals, Step 1, Step 2, residency. “Each time I’ve hit one of those checkpoints, I haven’t really known what was going to happen. But then things have gone way better than what I expected. I certainly think that in the coming years, particularly once residency starts, I might have to take a break [from triathlon] for a year or two, or modify how often I race. But I don’t say anything with certainty, because so far, everything has worked out.”

You can follow Matthew Marquardt on Instagram @Matthewdmarquardt .