Country United States Role Olympic athlete Highest ranking 275 Name Mesinee Mangkalakiri Coach Tony Gunawan | Weight 61 kg Handedness Right Height 1.70 m | |
Born 21 April 1983 (age 41)
Los Alamitos, California ( 1983-04-21 ) Residence Garden Grove, California, United States | ||
Current ranking 315 (21 February 2013) | ||
Mesinee "May" Mangkalakiri (Thai: เมษิณี มังคละคีรี; rtgs: Mesini Mangkhala-khiri; born April 21, 1983 in Los Alamitos, California) is an American badminton player of Thai descent. She won a bronze medal, along with her partner Raju Rai, in the mixed doubles at the 2003 Pan American Games in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. She repeated her bronze medal performance with her new partner Bob Malaythong in the mixed doubles, and also, beat Canada's Fiona McKee and Charmaine Reid for the gold in the women's doubles at the 2007 Pan American Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Mangkalakiri is also a member of Orange County Badminton Club in Anaheim, California, and is coached and trained by former Olympic doubles champion Tony Gunawan (2000), who is currently playing for the United States.
Mangkalakiri qualified for the women's doubles at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, by placing fourteenth and receiving an allocated entry from the Badminton World Federation's ranking list. Mangkalakiri and her partner and former high school teammate Eva Lee, however, lost the preliminary round match to the Singaporean pair Jiang Yanmei and Li Yujia, with a score of 12–21 each in two straight periods.