Christina Mchale

McHale will be making her Olympic debut in the midst of playing some of the best tennis of her career, as she's made three straight third-round appearances in Grand Slams - the 2011 U.S. Open and 2012's Australian and French Open. Prior to last summer, she had won a total of just two matches over seven majors. Her breakthrough came at last year’s U.S. Open, where she upset eighth-seeded Marion Bartoli of France in the second round. She carried that momentum into this season, earning another career highlight by shocking 2011 Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova at Indian Wells in March. The ebullient McHale appears to be one of the rising stars on the WTA Tour, as she just turned 20 in May. She extended 2011 French Open champion Li Na of China to three sets in a third-round loss in Roland Garros this year, then charmed Chinese media at her press conference by speaking Mandarin. Born in New Jersey, McHale learned the language since she spent some of her childhood years in Hong Kong - where she began to learn tennis and also was a competitive swimmer. A member of the United States Fed Cup team since 2010, McHale marked her debut appearance at Wimbledon last year with a first-round win over No. 28 seed Ekaterina Makarova of Russia before bowing out the following round.