2017-05-18 17:06:00 CET
Update from Rio de Janeiro
Rio 4-star World Tour tournament commenced just two days ago on 16 May and qualifications are officially done and dusted!
Austrian Olympians Robin Seidl and Alexander Huber have made it into the Main Draw albeit with different partners – Seidl teaming up with Tobias Winter and Huber with Julian Hörl – one teams a step closer to the USD 300,000 prizemoney up for grabs.
Other qualifiers include Brazilian teams: Oscar/Hevaldo from the men’s side and Josi/Lili and Juliana/Carol from the women’s side. This takes the total from eight to a whopping 11 host nation teams in the Main Draw – one could say that it’s a Brazilian bonanza.
First of the pool play matches are scheduled to take place later today using the FIVB’s “modified” pool play, which cuts the number of matches from six to four per pool group. That means eliminations are coming fast and teams better bring their A-Game if they want to move on.
For many teams - it’s the first tournament of the year that marks the end of a three month hiatus following the Fort Lauderdale Major; and also the first tournament where teams can compete with their actual teammates like Alex Ranghieri who temporarily teamed up with Marco Caminati at the Fort Lauderdale Major; is now reunited with bestie Adrian Carambula. Not forgetting Kira Walkenhorst and Laura Ludwig, Laura was out of action for the Fort Lauderdale Major due to a shoulder injury which led to Kira teaming up with Julia Grossner.
It’s definitely going to be a race to the finish line, teams can stretch their legs and warm up in Rio for the jam-packed upcoming Swatch Major Series beach season – can you believe we’ve already passed the less-than-50-day marker for the Poreč and Gstaad Major?
View the men’s and women’s main draw and stayed tuned on swatchmajorseries.com this week to find out the results of the all-important medals.
Good luck guys!