By SwimSwam Contributors on SwimSwam
Courtesy of Patrick Mader.
Patrick is a writer for mnathletes.com, a website dedicated to featuring Minnesota athletes in a wide range of sports. See the website here.
As emotionally draining and physically taxing it is to balance a rigorous academic schedule and elite athletic career in a demanding sport like swimming can be, Martin Zielinski has managed to accomplish the tasks. A state champion and All-American, Martin has recently accepted a position at Baylor as Chief of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery following a near two-decade stint at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.
The Zielinski family moved to Apple Valley, Minnesota, from Pennsylvania when Martin—born in 1977—was six years old. A nearby lake caused his mother safety concerns for Martin and his sister, Katheryn, resulting in the start of Red Cross swimming lessons. Martin admits he enjoyed swimming because he was good at it.
Later the family moved to Bloomington and Martin valued the tutoring of a succession of coaches: John Thomas, Jim Anderson, and especially Dave Anderson, an assistant swim coach at the University of Minnesota (U of M). “Martin was an incredibly driven, successful competitor,” Anderson notes. “However, it was his humor and wit that made training sessions enjoyable and entertaining. He quickly adopted underwater kicking. He was a natural. Without much training at all using underwater kicking, he won the USA Junior meet in his specialty, the butterfly.”
In 9th grade, Martin qualified for state and in 1994, his junior year, the Bloomington Jefferson boys’ swim team claimed the state championship with Martin capturing the 100-yard butterfly title. As a senior, Martin again won the 100-yard butterfly title with a high school national-best time of 48.20 seconds, a state high school record for 26 years until it was broken in 2021 by Chris Morris of St. Cloud Tech. In addition, Martin swam to victory in the 100-yard backstroke with a time of 50.35 seconds.
Piqued by athletic scholarships to national swimming powers USC and Auburn, Martin decided to accept an offer to the U of M. “It was the best fit for me at the time,” Martin explains. “The academic reputation of the medical school and the state-of-the-art Aquatic Center were appealing.”
Another enticing factor was coach Anderson. “When his archrival [Tom Malchow, a 1996 and 2000 Olympian, winning silver and gold medals respectively] committed to Michigan, it was imperative to Martin as a Gopher. He filled an important role as the Gophers’ butterflier during his career.” Martin was disappointed when Anderson departed the program by the time he enrolled.
As a freshman in 1996, Martin earned recognition as an All-American honorable mention. He also earned an invitation to the Olympic Trials, placing 25th in the 100-meter butterfly. “It was the penultimate experience for an eighteen-year-old,” Martin says of the Trials. Showing steady progress, Martin won the Big Ten 100-yard butterfly championship in 1997, breaking the conference record by 0.4 seconds in a time of 47.0 seconds. He then proceeded to place 4th in the event at the NCAA National Swimming Championships. By the end of his collegiate career in 1999, Martin was a seven-time Big Ten champion, a 10-time (including relays) NCAA Division I All-American, and a 2-time Academic All-American.
A personal highlight for Martin was winning the Phillips 66 National Swimming Championship in the 100-meter butterfly in April 1998, qualifying him for the Goodwill Games. “I went out fast, and after doing the turn, I realized I was ahead of some great swimmers!” While the competition did not go well for Martin at the Nassau County Aquatic Center in New York, he was delighted to have the opportunity to meet Olympic figure skater Michelle Kwan and famed New Yorker George Steinbrenner.
Having qualified for the 2000 Olympic Trials, Martin faced a choice on whether to continue rigorous training for another year. Instead, he opted to concentrate on his goal of being a medical doctor. “It would have necessitated a pause in academics, and I was not willing to do it,” Martin says of his decision. Following medical school, Martin accepted an internship at Mayo Clinic in Rochester in 2003. Specializing in trauma and acute care surgery, Martin also served at Mayo until this year (2022) when he accepted a position at Baylor in Houston, Texas.
The year 2003 proved to be a busy one for Martin: he graduated from medical school, purchased a home, and married Rochester native Dr. Elizabeth Lorenz, a transplant nephrologist he met in medical school. The couple has three children.
As with many athletes, Martin gives back to his sport: he finds serving as a Team USA Swimming medical provider for entire trips “very rewarding and a fun experience.”
Coach Dave Anderson sums up Martin’s career, saying, “He could work like a sled dog. He was funny and driven.” And the rigorous academic schedule he completed, and his elite athletic career prove it.
You can find this article on mnathletes.com here.
Read the full story on SwimSwam: Martin Zielinski: Longtime Record Holder Now Chief of Trauma And Acute Care Surgery At Baylor