Volleyball Empowerment support for Vieira and Chamereau pays off with another Beach Pro Tour medal

Ahead of hosting next year’s Olympic Games in Paris, French beach volleyball is being supported by the revolutionary programme of FIVB Volleyball Empowerment. Thanks to this coach support, amounting to nearly CHF 600,000, France continues to see success on the sand, with its most recent achievement being women’s pair Clemence Vieira’s (pictured in the main photo; credits: cev.eu) and Aline Chamereau’s bronze at the Beach Pro Tour Warsaw Futures in Poland, following up on the duo’s silver at their previous appearance at the Lille Futures at home.

Since 2019, French beach volleyball has benefitted from both application and targeted-based coach support, with the goal for its national teams to challenge for a podium spot at Paris 2024 and, ultimately, build a lasting legacy for beach volleyball development in France. 22-year-old Vieira and 27-year-old Chamereau are one of many French duos who have benefitted from the Volleyball Empowerment programme.

In the women’s final, Austria’s Dorina Klinger and Ronja Klinger outplayed Poland’s Jagoda Gruszczynska and Aleksandra Wachowicz to take gold, while on the men’s podium, Latvia’s Martins Plavins and Kristians Fokerots, Poland’s Jedrzej Brozyniak and Piotr Janiak and Latvia’s Olivers Bulgacs and Edgars Tocs took gold, silver and bronze, respectively.

Third-seeded Vieira and Chamereau started their Warsaw campaign with three consecutive wins: 2-0 (21-9, 21-6) over Czechia’s Anna Pavelkova and Katerina Pavelkova, 2-1 (24-22, 17-21, 15-10) over second-seeded Puerto Ricans Allanis Navas Sanchez and Maria Gonzalez and 2-0 (21-18, 21-11) over another Czech pair, Valerie Dvornikova and Anna Pospisilova.

They suffered their first defeat in the semifinals, a hard-fought 2-1 (21-16, 17-21, 15-8) at the hands of the third-seeded Klinger sisters, before getting back on the winning track with a 2-1 (18-21, 21-18, 15-10) comeback against Norway’s Sunniva Helland-Hansen and Emilie Olimstad in the bronze medal game.

Austria’s Ronja Klinger dives in defence (Photo credits: cev.eu)

Vieira and Chamereau were the only team that managed to take a set from Austria’s Klinger and Klinger, who topped the podium after five consecutive victories in the Polish capital. 26-year-old Dorina Klinger and 23-year-old Ronja Klinger crowned their campaign with a 2-0 (21-14, 21-19) sweep of the final against the top-seeded home team of Gruszczynska and Wachowicz to celebrate their second Beach Pro Tour medal, after the Ios Futures gold last year.

The Warsaw silver was also the second Beach Pro Tour medal for 28-year-old Gruszczynska and 31-year-old Wachowicz, after their Bialystok Futures bronze in 2022. They lost their opening game in pool play but bounced back to claim four wins in a row, crowned by a 2-0 (22-20, 21-17) semifinal victory over Helland-Hansen and Olimstad.

Latvia’s veteran star Martins Plavins (Photo credits: cev.eu)

For the first time in his impressive career, 38-year-old three-time Olympian and London 2012 bronze medallist Martins Plavins competed internationally alongside 18-year-old Kristians Fokerots, a 2022 U19 world champion and U18 European champion. They cruised through five back-to-back victories, losing only a set in the process. In the semifinals, the fourth-seeded Latvians achieved a 2-0 (21-18, 21-17) win over their compatriots, seventh-seeded qualifiers Olivers Bulgacs and Edgars Tocs, and followed up with a tough 2-0 (26-24, 21-16) sweep of the final against second-seeded Poles Jedrzej Brozyniak and Piotr Janiak. Previously, Plavins and Fokerots had one Futures bronze, each with different partners.

Brozyniak and Janiak also reached the final losing only a single set along the way. In the semifinals, the Poles squeezed out a narrow 2-0 (22-20, 22-20) victory over Lithuania’s Artur Vasiljev and Robert Juchnevic to secure their fourth Beach Pro Tour podium, after last year’s silver in Warsaw and the bronze medals at the 2022 Budapest Futures and the 2023 Spiez Futures.

Starting from the qualifiers in Warsaw, 19-year-old Bulgacs and 34-year-old Tocs played as many as eight games in the tournament, losing only two of them, one to each of the two finalists. In pool play, they lost to Brozyniak and Janiak and in the semifinals to Plavins and Fokerots. The Latvians bounced back with a 2-1 (21-18, 19-21, 15-12) win over Vasiljev and Juchnevic in the third-place match to pocket their first medals in their third appearance on the Tour as a team.

The 2023 Warsaw Futures medallists (Photo credits: cev.eu)

A total of 57 teams representing 20 different countries took part in the Warsaw Futures.

Beach Pro Tour 2023 full event schedule