Japan’s two-time Olympian Miki Ishii and her current partner Mayu Kikuchi topped the women’s podium at the second Futures event of the year on the Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour, held this week in Sanya. Two Chinese teams pleased the home crowd with the other women’s medals - Yu Tong & Qi Siyu claimed silver, while Cao Shuting & Mushajiang Aheidan earned bronze. Germany’s Niklas Held & Luis Kubo made it from the qualifications all the way to the men’s trophy. Sweden’s Theodor Grahn & Linus Isaksson and Poland’s Aleksander Czachorowski & Jakub Krzeminski completed the podium with silver and bronze.
Second-seeded Miki Ishii & Mayu Kikuchi went through the tournament on a 5-1 win-loss record. In Sunday’s final showdown, they got back at 10th-seeded Yu Tong & Qi Siyu for the loss they suffered in their pool final with a 2-0 (21-19, 21-16) sweep to crown the duo’s Beach Pro Tour debut with gold. It was the first-ever podium finish both for 36-year-old Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024 Olympian Ishii and for 24-year-old Kikuchi.
In their semifinal, Ishii & Kikuchi squeezed out a nail-biting 2-1 (21-18, 18-21, 19-17) upset of top-seeded home favorites Cao Shuting & Mushajiang Aheidan deep into the overtime of the tie-breaker, while 21-year-old Yu & 16-year-old Qi came back from a set down to overcome ninth-seeded Japanese qualifiers Harumi Sakai & Shion Tsubouchi with a dramatic 2-1 (20-22, 22-20, 15-11) victory and secure their first Beach Pro Tour podium as a team.
Cao & Aheidan bounced back with a 2-0 (21-11, 21-19) sweep of the third-place game against Sakai & Tsubouchi, decorating their Tour debut as a duo with a bronze medal.
