The world number 1 with her eyes on the top prize

2013 badminton world champion Ratchanok Intanon heads to Rio hoping to become the first Thai woman to win an Olympic gold medal outside of weightlifting.

The 21-year-old, who began playing at the age of 6, has always made her sporting ambitions clear: "To win an Olympic gold medal and to be number 1 in the world." She is already halfway there, having topped the women's singles rankings for the first time in April 2016.

Intanon has been on phenomenal form on the road to Rio, with a win on home soil at the Thailand Masters, followed by successive world superseries titles in India, Malaysia and Singapore.

Badminton's rising star, who reached the quarter-finals in London 2012 as a 17-year-old, is now hoping to make history in Brazil.