The Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour returns to Haikou for another Challenge event this week, after the Chinese city welcomed the Tour for the first time about a year ago, in November 2022. The tournament will start on four competition courts on Wednesday, November 13, with the two rounds of men’s and the first round of women’s qualification matches. The second round of women’s qualifiers will be played on Thursday morning, after which main draw action will get underway and last through Sunday, November 17, when the semifinals and the medal matches in both genders will be played.
Beach Pro Tour
Olympic medallists Clancy and Xue to hit Haikou Challenge with new partners
The Beach Pro Tour event in China starts on Wednesday
Published 02:24, 12 Nov 2024
- Watch the Haikou Challenge on VBTV.
Two Olympic medallists are set to grace the Haikou main draw. However, both will appear in the sand with new partners. Tokyo 2020 Olympic silver medallist and three-time Olympian Taliqua Clancy of Australia will not be on the courts together with Mariafe Artacho Del Solar. Instead, the 32-year-old blocker has partnered with 26-year-old Georgia Johnson, who has been starring on the Tour mainly at the Futures level. They are pre-seeded third on entry points in the women’s main draw.
Beijing 2008 bronze medallist and four-time Olympian Xue Chen will also appear in Haikou with a new partner. 35-year-old Xue has teamed up with 23-year-old Zeng Jinjin, who also has a few Futures medals in her collection. The new Chinese duo is pre-seeded fifth in the main draw. Xue’s previous partner, 35-year-old Xia Xinyi, will also compete in Haikou with another partner, 27-year-old Wang Jingzhe, who topped the podium at her most recent Tour appearance, at the Qingdao Futures. They lead the Haikou women’s line-up on entry points. The two newly-formed Chinese pairs have not only already tested themselves in competition, but have also played against one another. At last week’s Asian Beach Volleyball Championship in the Philippines, they locked horns in the final, with Wang & Xia beating Xue & Zeng in straight sets to triumph as continental champions.
The women’s main draw features a number of other well-known names, like Finland’s Taru Lahti-Liukkonen & Niina Ahtiainen, pre-seeded second, French Olympians Clemence Vieira & Aline Chamereau or Austria’s Lena Plesiutschnig & Katharina Schutzenhofer, to name a few.
Another pair of French Olympians, Lezana Placette & Alexia Richard, will start their Haikou campaign from the qualifiers, where the bracket features a number of other familiar names as well. For example, last year’s Haikou silver medallists Cao Shuting & Zhu Lingdi of China will start from this year’s qualifiers, but their separate ways with different partners - Zhang Xinchen and Yuan Lvwen, respectively.
The men’s main draw line-up features some Paris 2024 Olympians, like Australia’s Thomas Hodges & Zachery Schubert, who won bronze in Haikou last year, or France’s Remi Bassereau, who will take to the sand in Haikou with Calvin Aye as a partner. Haikou 2023 silver medallist Theodore Brunner of the United States will now return with Timothy Brewster as a partner, while another American, Chaim Schalk, who reached the Haikou semifinals last year, will now compete alongside James Shaw. Newly-crowned Asian champions D'Artagnan Potts & Jack Pearse of Australian will also test their luck at this week’s Challenge event in China.
Hodges/Schubert vs. Schalk/Bourne - Bronze Match Highlights | Haikou 2023 #BeachProTour
Italian Olympian Enrico Rossi and Austrian Olympian Alexander Huber are two of the names that draw attention in the men’s qualification list. They will compete alongside Manuel Alfieri and Felix Friedl, respectively.
Two members of Norway’s Mol dynasty – 22-year-old Markus and 20-year-old Adrian – will appear on the Beach Pro Tour together for the second time. Their first joint venture in September resulted in a Balikesir Futures fourth place. Anders Mol’s younger brothers will also start from the qualifiers.
Haikou Challenge action will get underway on Wednesday morning at 08:00 local time (00:00 UTC).
