Fuzhou, China again opening FIVB Beach Volleyball season

The 2014 FIVB beach volleyball international competition calendar begins for the second straight year with the Fuzhou Open in China when the capital city of the Fujian province will host the men’s and women’s Open from April 22 to 27.

This will be the second time Fuzhou will host an FIVB Open international event. In last year’s inaugural event, the gold medal winners for men was the USA team of Phil Dalhausser/Sean Rosenthal and for the women was China’s two-time Olympic team of Chen Xue/Xi Zhang. The city also organised the AVC Beach Volleyball Continental Cup in June 2012 where Australia bagged first place in the women’s tournament and Japan in the men’s.

Fuzhou is one of eight Chinese cities to host an international FIVB beach volleyball event. Others have been Beijing, Dalian, Lianyungang, Maoming, Sanya, Shanghai and Xiamen.

In addition to the FIVB Fuzhou Open, two other stops are scheduled in China in 2014 on the FIVB international schedule: the FIVB Shanghai Grand Slam (April 29 to May 4) and the FIVB Xiamen Open (October 7 to 12). All three will be double-gender events.

The 2014 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour will include 10 Grand Slam events, a new FIVB Grand Slam Final and 11 FIVB Beach Volleyball Open events.

The 11 FIVB Beach Volleyball Opens on the 2014 FIVB World Tour include seven double-gender, two men-only and two women-only tournaments, adding numerous possibilities for athletes to compete in high quality, FIVB international competition.

The 2014 FIVB World Ranking system will include FIVB Beach Volleyball Grand Slam and Open events along with additional pre-approved events at the inter-continental, continental and national levels.

Implemented in 2013, the format of all the FIVB Beach Volleyball international tournaments – whether FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships, FIVB Beach Volleyball Grand Slam or FIVB Beach Volleyball Open – are the same, featuring pool play followed by single elimination knockout rounds.

The 2014-2016 FIVB Beach Volleyball Continental Cup also returns this year as it starts its portion of the qualification process for the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Olympic Games.