2012 Olympics

Yellowave - A Pre Olympic Games Training Camp

Yellowave is Brighton’s only official 2012 training base. This means that the venue has been given the LOCOG stamp of approval that it meets international requirements for teams to train here in the run up to the Olympics.

The qualification process for beach volleyball is at the end of June so we won’t know if any teams plan to use the facilities until quite near to the Olympics. We’ve been in contact with the majority of countries likely to qualify and we’ve even met with some of the head coaches including Switzerland, Australia and Holland. Teams are very used to travelling all around the world for competitions so they may simply go straight into the Olympic village in London, we just have to wait and see but we’ll keep you posted.

To view the centre on the official Olympic training camp site click here

London 2012 Beach Volleyball

The London 2012 Olympic Beach Volleyball event is to be held in a temporary stadium holding 15,000 spectators in the spectacular location of Horse Guards Parade. A women's trial event was held in August 2011 and was a great success. Beach volleyball has been one of the most popular of all the spectator sports - estimating 480,000 people will watch in London. Beach volleyball has one of the most expensive tickets of all the Olympic disciplines with final tickets going for £450! 

As host nation Team GB will get one automatic qualification. There are two women’s teams with GB funding.  So, one automatic place will go to either Denise Johns/Lucy Boulton or to Zara Dampney/Shauna Mullin. Both teams are training really hard and competing on the World FIVB Circuit to accrue as many points as possible.

The men’s teams have to fund themselves. This is because there was a cut in UK Sport cash and when the funding was allocated the men’s teams weren’t doing as well on the world circuit as the women. There are three teams who are really going for it. They are Jody Gooding/Greg Weaver, Steve Grotowski/John Garcia-Thompson and Tom Lord/Robin Meidzybrodzki. Again one team will get an automatic place. However any of the teams could qualify in their own right, which would be fantastic. Everyone at Yellowave is rooting for them big time!

Some of the top teams include: 
Brazil, USA, Poland, Holland, China, Germany, Czech Rep, Switzerland

Calling all National Olympic Commitees