Kawanaka won a bronze medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in the women's team event with teammates Ren Hayakawa and Miki Kanie.

Their success, which came after a narrow victory over Russia in the third-place match, marked the first Olympic medal for Japan in team archery.

[2] Kawanaka was less successful in the women's individual event, losing in the opening elimination round.

She was the flagbearer for the Japanese team at the opening ceremony of the 2014 Asian Games,[4] and later won bronze in the women's team recurve competition with Hayakawa and Yuki Hayashi.

This biographical article relating to a Japanese archery figure is a stub.