RAPINOE MEGAN

• Nickname is “Pinoe”
• She is an advocate for equality and human rights organizations including LGBTQ, Human Rights Campaign and LA Gay and Lesbian Center and is part of their mission of equality for all people.
• Enjoys playing guitar, the beach, coffee, music and shopping.
• Majored in sociology with a minor in political science.
• Has a twin sister, Rachael, who also played soccer at Portland.
•  Prefers living in a city.
• Her favorite cities are Sydney, London, San Francisco, Phuket, Thailand, Chicago, Boston, Seattle and Portland.
• Her hometown of Redding, California, recognizes Sept. 10 as Megan Rapinoe Day.
• She is the co-founder/co-owner of Rapinoe SC, a business she owns with her twin sister Rachael.
• The company’s mission is to “Inspire and celebrate the physical and emotional exploration of what it means to Be Your Best You.”

A Free Spirit Megan and her twin sister Rachael were the youngest of six children, and they had a Tom Sawyer-like childhood. They roamed the land, climbing the giant oak tree, fishing for crawfish in the creek, playing one-on-one basketball or baseball or soccer on the neighboring fields, playing house in the chicken coop. "It’s like a little penned-in area, with a little house. It was disgusting – it was a chicken coop – but you could kind of get in there and we loved it." Rapinoe brings to the game a creative, free-flowing, improvised quality – a quality that may have grown out of the childhood where she was given a lot of freedom to roam. The kid who grew up playing in the chicken coop has now lived in cities all over the world, from Lyon, France to Portland, Oregon. In Lyon, playing for Olympique Lyonnais, she visited museums and opera houses, walked cobblestone streets, raced her Smart Car against the men’s teams Ferarris and Maserrattis. In Seattle, she lived on Capitol Hill, which she describes as "gay-friendly, straight-friendly, trans-friendly, everything friendly," a place "where you never had to think about [sexuality] ever, which is really important to me." "I’ve loved living in different places. I like having that experience." Yet the continent-hopping lifestyle of a National Team soccer player means she also gravitates toward having a place to call home. CAPS/GOALS - 140/38