Northwest Asian Weekly has compiled a list of Asian Americans competing in the Olympics. The article shows pictures of eighteen Asian Americans representing the US, some of whom we have talked about before, like Tamari Miyashiro and Ariel Hsing and Lily Zhang. A lot of are in what I think of as typically Asian sports, like table tennis and badminton. Others were more of a surprise.
One surprise area (at least to me) were Asian American fencers like Lee Kiefer and Alex Massialas. At 18, Kiefer is the youngest member of the fencing team. Massialas is part of a San Francisco fencing club with many highly ranked Asian American fencers. I didn’t even know that there were Asian American fencers! In another sport that I don’t normally associate with Asians is Sandra Uptagrafft, who represents the US in pistol shooting.
The article mentions that other Asian Americans are back ups or possible replacements. Notable in this set of Asian Americans is Gerek Meinhardt, who is in the same fencing club in San Francisco as Alex Massialas. I also didn’t see swimmer Natalie Coughlin listed (one quarter Filipino).
