Grimalt & Grimalt earn Xiamen Challenge gold with FIVB Volleyball Empowerment coach Adriano Cerqueira
Trained by FIVB Volleyball Empowerment coaching staff, Krou & Gauthier-Rat take silver
Pfretzschner & Winter complete the men’s podium
FIVB Volleyball Empowerment beneficiaries Alvarez & Moreno land women’s bronze in China
Borger & Ittlinger outplay Mader & Verge-Depre in the women’s final
As many as three of the six spots on last week’s Beach Pro Tour Challenge podiums in Xiamen were occupied by teams benefitting from FIVB Volleyball Empowerment coach support. Chile’s Marco Grimalt & Esteban Grimalt (pictured in the main photo) topped the podium in the men’s competition after outpacing France’s Youssef Krou & Arnaud Gauthier-Rat in the final. Spain’s Daniela Alvarez & Tania Moreno, on the other hand, celebrated bronze in the women’s tournament.
Germany’s Karla Borger & Sandra Ittlinger defeated Switzerland’s Joana Mader & Anouk Verge-Depre in the women’s gold medal match, while another German pair, Lukas Pfretzschner & Sven Winter, completed the men’s podium.
Chile’s beach volleyball programme has so far been granted coach support of CHF 72,000, in addition to CHF 9,500 worth of beach volleyball equipment from FIVB Volleyball Empowerment, and Brazilian coach Adriano Bonina Cerqueira has been in charge of their national duos. Meanwhile, France’s national beach volleyball pairs have been trained by a fully staffed coaching team, headed by another Brazilian specialist, Lissandro Carvalho, with coach support funding from FIVB Volleyball Empowerment totalling CHF 795,000 so far. Spain’s beach volleyball has received coach support, worth a total of CHF 180,000 to date, and their women’s national teams have been training under yet another Brazilian coach, Marco Pires Albuquerque.
Entering the tournament as the fifth-seeded team in Thursday’s qualifiers and getting the 18th seed in the 24-team main draw, the Grimalt cousins had a difficult road to the top in Xiamen. Starting the main draw with a loss, they bounced back with five wins in a row to reach the gold, but in all of their last four matches they persevered through tie-breaker third sets, each time coming back from a set down to achieve an impressive comeback. In Sunday’s semifinals, the Chileans mounted a 2-1 (18-21, 21-19, 15-12) turnaround against Pfretzschner & Winter. Then they overcame a first-set setback in the final against Krou & Gauthier-Rat to celebrate a 2-1 (17-21, 21-18, 15-9) victory and their second-ever medal on the Beach Pro Tour, after the Gstaad Elite16 gold in 2022.
Before the Grimalts’ comeback in the gold medal match, 21st-seeded Krou & Gauthier-Rat had not dropped a single set in Xiamen. They crowned their perfect run with a 2-0 (21-18, 21-18) semifinal shutout of fourth-seeded Americans Chase Budinger & Miles Evans to secure their fourth Beach Pro Tour medal. The French pair had previously collected one of each colour.
Seeded second in the main draw, Pfretzschner & Winter had few issues on the way to the semifinals, mastering four straight-set victories in a row. After losing to the Grimalts, they recovered with a 2-1 (15-21, 21-15, 15-13) win over Budinger & Evans to grab the bronze, their second medal in two appearances on the Tour so far this season. The Germans took the silver at the Guadalajara Challenge earlier this month.
On the women’s side, 10th-seeded Alvarez & Moreno reached the semifinals on a 3-1 win-loss record, after falling to Canada’s Heather Bansley & Sophie Bukovec in a three-set Pool C final. Another three-set battle decided the Spanish duo’s destiny in the duel with Mader & Verge-Depre for a spot in the final. The Swiss squeezed out a nail-biting 2-1 (25-23, 15-21, 17-15) win to progress, while the Spaniards had to recover with a 2-0 (21-16, 21-16) sweep of the bronze medal match against Lithuania’s Monika Paulikiene & Aine Raupelyte, seeded eighth in the main draw. Alvarez & Moreno’s total Beach Pro Tour tally now stands at one silver and three bronze medals.
Second-seeded Borger & Ittlinger and ninth-seeded Mader & Verge-Depre went through five consecutive wins each to reach the women’s final. In Sunday’s gold medal match, the Germans got the job done in straight sets, 2-0 (22-20, 21-14), to celebrate their first-ever Beach Pro Tour gold. Their only previous podium as a pair brought them silver at the Goa Challenge last fall, where they lost the final to Mader & Verge-Depre, for whom the Xiamen silver was also the second Beach Pro Tour medal, after the gold in Goa. To get to the final in Xiamen, Borger & Ittlinger mastered a 2-0 (21-19, 21-15) sweep of their semifinal against Paulikiene & Raupelyte.
The Xiamen Challenge 2024 medallists (Photo credits: Xiamen-Siming Challenge)
43 men’s and 42 women’s teams representing a total of 25 different countries took part in the Xiamen Challenge. The Beach Pro Tour will return to Brazil this week for an Elite16 event in the capital Brasilia from 1 to 5 May. The next Challenge event is in Stare Jablonki, Poland from 30 May to 2 June.
Xiamen Challenge: results and standings