Guido Claessen graduated as a medical doctor at KU Leuven in 2010. In 2015 he obtained a PhD focusing on the evaluation of cardiac function during exercise in the setting of endurance athletes and patients with pulmonary vascular disease and heart failure. After graduating as a cardiologist in 2018 he completed a fellowship in sports and exercise cardiology at the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute in Melbourne and St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne under the supervision of Prof. La Gerche. At present, he works as an academic cardiologist in the department of cardiovascular sciences at the University Hospitals Leuven. His primary research focus is the interaction between exercise and the heart and the integration of exercise evaluation into the clinical management of patients with vascular disease.