Beach volleyball

Austria’s teams start the new season in Mexico

Timo Hammarberg/Tim Berger

(Bild: GEPA pictures)

After the big shake-up in the Austrian men's beach volleyball teams, the Austrian athletes are starting the new season at a challenge tournament in Mexico these days!

While Dorina and Ronja Klinger are the only ÖVV team in the women's competition in Progreso, six men's duos will be trying their luck. Timo Hammarberg/Tim Berger and the newly formed duo Christoph Dressler/Philipp Waller are fixed in the main competition.

Following the separation of Alexander Horst and Julian Hörl, the two Olympic participants will now be competing with new partners. The 42-year-old veteran Horst will play with 24-year-old Laurenz Leitner and should use his experience to help the Viennese gain a foothold on the FIVB ProTour. "We could make an exciting pairing," Horst speculates. The duo's goal is to take part in the World Championships in Australia.

Klinger sisters trained with Olympic champions
Hörl and his new athletic partner Moritz Pristauz also want to show that they are a well-coordinated duo in Yucatan: "We have grown together and have been able to gain a lot of self-confidence in training competitions," says Hörl confidently ahead of the competition. "We're going into this season with four teams, which is going to be a very long one. We're already looking forward to the first tournament matches and want to do as well in Yucatan as we did at the end of last season in Chennai and Nuvali," explained men's head coach Martin Olejnak.

For the Klinger sisters, the season had already begun with a highlight in training. At the invitation of the Olympic champions from Paris, Ana Patricia Silva Ramos and Eduarda Santos Lisboa, the two recently trained for two and a half weeks in Uberlandia in Brazil. The Challenge Tournament in Yucatan starts on Wednesday with the qualifiers, in which Moritz Kindl/Paul Pascariuc and Laurenc Grössig/Mathias Seiser will also try their hand, with the group matches starting on Thursday.