Beijing Olympics, 2009
Asenate "Nancy" Manoa competed for Tuvalu as its first female Olympian, competing in the Beijing Olympics as part of the women's 100 meters races. Manoa was 16 years old when she first competed in Beijing. After initially training on the runway of Funafuti International Airport, Manoa trained in Suva, Fiji in preparation for the games. She was mentored by members of Fiji’s track team, and worked at the offices of the regional Olympic administrator, ONOC. She had never used starting blocks or run on a synthetic track before arriving in Beijing. Slight of figure, she weighs 101 lbs (46 kg).
She competed in the 100m sprint. Her time of 14.05 was the slowest in her heat, but was a Tuvaluan national record.
The Guardian described her as "impossibly tiny for an international sprinter", and noted that, in the Beijing National Stadium, she was "running in front of an audience 10 times the size of her country's population".
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