Chinese Taipei's No 1 tennis player Chan Yung-jan has one birthday wish this year - to play the Olympics final on the day she turns 19.
"My birthday is August 17 which happens to be the last day of the tennis games and I do hope to play on that day," said Chan, who will make her Olympic debut in both singles and doubles in Beijing.
For the doubles, she will team up with 23-year-old Chuang Chia-jung. The pair won the WTA Rome International in May.
Chan currently ranks 71 in the world in singles and ninth in doubles, while Chuang is eighth in doubles.
To get into her best shape, Chan has been training with a team of French coaches and has been playing on the US and Canadian tours to familiarize herself with the hardcourt surfaces that will be used in Beijing.
"I want to push myself to the best condition and keep the mood of being in a competition before the Olympics," she told AFP before a training session in Taipei.
Chan and Chuang made a breakthrough in 2007 by reaching the Australian Open women's doubles final, although they lost the final in their Grand Slam debut to Zimbabwe's Cara Black and South Africa's Liezel Huber.
The duo, which was only playing in its third Tour-level event together and their first major, became the first from the island to play a major final.
They followed it up by making the US Open final the same year.
Chinese Taipei has never won an Olympic tennis medal and hopes are high that Chan and Chuang can make history in Beijing.
Chan, a native of Tungshih in central Taiwan, started learning tennis at six from her father Chan Yuan-liang, who serves as a coach for the Chinese Taipei Olympic tennis team.