The future of beach volleyball is in their hands!

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Piotr Kantor and Bartosz Losiak won Under-21 World Championship gold in 2012 and went on to win silver at our Stavanger Major last year. Photo credit: Samo Vidic/Red Bull Content Pool.

It’s now time for the youngsters to take center stage and step-up as the Under-21 World Championships kick-off in Lucerne, Switzerland on Wednesday!

The best of the world’s up-and-coming beach volleyball talent go toe-to-toe for six days of typically competitive action on the sand which will guarantee plenty of thrills and spills – and give us a glimpse into the future.

Browsing through the record books, the Under-21 World Championship roll of honor is a veritable who’s who of one-time protégés who are now the game’s household names right here, right now in 2016.

Men’s gold medals at this coveted competition in the past have been hung around the necks of Pedro Solberg, Paolo Nicolai, Aleksandrs Samoilovs, Piotr Kantor and Bartosz Losiak.

In the women’s tournament Anouk Vergé-Dépré and Joana Heidrich have taken gold while Marta Menegatti and Viktoria Orsi Toth have a silver medal to their name.

Two years ago Polish pair Michal Bryl and Kacper Kujawiak won gold. That name rings a bell, right? And so it should, we wrote about their underdog story at the Xiamen Open last month. Their performance continued Poland’s proud record in this tournament – only Brazil have won more medals than the Poles’ 11.

So can Poland dominate on the shores of Lake Lucerne this week?

Well, as you’d expect, the Poles – and the rest of the world – will have to be on top of their game if they’re to deny more success for Brazil.

The winners of 19 medals in the tournament’s history have a strong hand this year with 17-year-old Eduarda Santos Lisboa going for gold in the women’s tournament. The reigning Under-19 champion has already struck gold on the senior World Tour, winning the Fortaleza Open two weeks ago.

A strong European challenge will come from Germany’s Lisa Arnholdt and Sarah Schneider, while North America will be pinning their hopes on Canadian twins Megan and Nicole McNamara.

Brazil also have a great shout of success in the men’s tournament with Under-19 gold medalists George Souto Maior Wanderley and Arthur Diego Mariano Lanci hunting a top podium place.

And don’t rule out youth Olympic champions from Russia Artem Yarzutkin and Oleg Stoyanovskiy or Under-20 European gold medallists Anders Berntsen Mol and Mathias Bernsten from Norway.

So what are we looking forward to finding out this week? Well it’s the names of the next generation of Swatch Major Series winners, obviously!

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