Sakura is not only an Olympian, but she became the first American to qualify for karate in the Olympics and the only female athlete that represented Karate from the US at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. Sakura Kokumai started karate at the age of 7 in Honolulu, Hawaii and she made the U.S. Junior National Team when she was 14. Since then, she won the gold medal in the women's individual kata event at the 2019 Pan American Games in Lima, Peru and is a 8-time Senior Pan American Champion, 4-time Junior Pan American Champion, World Combat Games Bronze Medalist, and 8-time USA National Champion. She is a graduate of Doshisha University and went on to pursue graduate studies at Waseda University in Japan.