Hedaya Malak ©Getty Images

While weightlifting and wrestling have been the richest source of Olympic medals for Egypt, taekwondo comes next on the all-time list, having provided four medals. Hedaya Malak is responsible for half of them.

The athlete from Cairo has been a standard bearer for Egyptian taekwondo for more than a decade, having taken up the sport aged six.

She made her senior international mark as an 18-year-old by winning the women's under-57 kilograms title at the 2011 African Games in Maputo, and went on to win the African Olympic Qualifying Tournament.

The following year she warmed up for the London 2012 Olympics by taking silver at the US and Dutch Open events, as well as golds at the Spanish Open and World Student Championships.

At London 2012, the then 19-year-old reached the quarter-finals, losing 8-6 to France's sixth seed Marlene Harnois.

The year 2015 proved highly successful for her as she won gold at the Military World Games in Mungyeong and took silver at the African Games in Brazzaville.

She also earned gold in the 2015 Grand Prix final in Mexico City.

She went into the Rio 2016 Olympic Games on the back of a morale-boosting victory at the African Championships.

At that point she was third in the World Taekwondo rankings, and she lived up to her billing in Brazil.

Having reached the semi-finals via a sudden-death victory over Japan's sixth seed Mayu Hamada, Malak missed out on reaching the final in similar excruciating fashion, losing 1-0 on sudden-death to Spain's Eva Calvo, who went on to take silver after losing to Britain's Jade Jones.

But Malak earned tangible reward for her talents by beating Belgium's Raheleh Asemani in her bronze-medal match - again 1-0 on sudden-death.

By the time she reached the postponed Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Malak had moved up the to under-67kg welterweight category, and there she lost 13-12 in the quarter-finals to Britain's eventual silver medallist Lauren Williams.

Once again, however, Malak found the way to the Olympic podium as she won a repechage against Tonga's Malia Paseka. She then earned a 17-6 victory in her bronze medal match against Paige McPherson of the United States.

Egypt's other Olympic taekwondo medals - also bronze - came in the men's under-58kg class at the Athens 2004 Games through Tamer Bayoumi, and in the men's under-80kg class at Tokyo 2020 through Seif Eissa.