Update as of August 8: Marques dropped a 15-8 decision in the round of 64 of the men's foil competition against Mohamed Essam from Egypt.  Marques will compete in the men's foil team event on August 12.

Henrique Marques, who is entering his junior year as a member of the NJIT men's fencing team, will make his Olympic debut in the individual fencing competition on August 7 and in the team event on August 12.

As a rising foil fencer on the international scene, Marques qualified for the Olympic team a year ago and in September, he made the top 4 in the national rankings. Marques, whose hometown is São Paulo, Brazil, is currently ranked second in Brazil.

"Qualifying for the Olympics was always my goal since I was a child and that is what I trained for," Marques says. "It is definitely one of the best feelings in the world, to have such a high goal and be able to achieve it so early in my career as an athlete. I felt that everything I trained for was paying off."

Marques has been training (physically and fencing) for the Olympics with his Brazilian club, Esporte Clube Pinheiros and teammates in São Paulo.

When asked if he was nervous about competing in the Olympics, Marques responded: "I think that at some point this whole thing about Olympics just became part of my routine. I spend most of my day in the fencing room, with other athletes that also qualified and I don't know exactly how to explain, but it just feels normal. But I guess this feeling will change as soon as I get in the Olympic Village with all the other athletes and Olympic atmosphere."

NBC will broadcast the Opening Ceremony of the Rio Olympics on Friday, August 5 beginning at 8 p.m. ET. Additionally, each event can be seen on the NBCOlympics.com live stream. For a more detailed view of the daily competition schedule, click here.

Earlier this year, Marques was among the NJIT school-record six fencers representing the Highlanders in the 2016 NCAA National Championships, where he placed 17^th on the men's foil strip.