Kuşadası, Turchia - challenge - Beach Pro Tour 2022 - News

05_BPT Rosarito - Men Main Draw BRAvsCZE

Ondrej Perusic in Beach Pro Tour action

Twenty-seven countries will be represented in the men's tournament at the Challenge event in Kuşadası, Turkey from May 19 to 22.

The 16 teams in the main draw are led by Czech stars Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner, the current number four team in the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Ranking, who skipped the Doha Challenge last week after finishing fifth in Rosarito and winning silver in Itapema.

New World Ranking leaders Stefan Boermans and Yorick de Groot of the Netherlands are seeded second in Kuşadası, after reaching the semifinals in Doha. The main draw listing features one more Dutch duo, Itapema bronze medallists Leon Luini and Ruben Penninga, in seed 13.

Another team to look out for will be Italian pair Adrian Carambula and Enrico Rossi, who will be back on Tour for their debut appearance at the Challenge level. So far on the Beach Pro Tour, they have only played at the inaugural Elite16 event in Mexico, where they finished fifth. They enter the Kuşadası main draw in seed three.

Their compatriots Daniele Lupo and Alex Ranghieri are placed two positions below them, while Estonians Kusti Nolvak and Mart Tiisaar, ranked 10th in the world, are placed between them in position four.

Seed six is for Latvian stars Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Janis Smedins. They played at the first two stops on the Beach Pro Tour in Mexico, claiming bronze in Tlaxcala, and will be back for more in Kuşadası after missing Itapema and Doha.

USA’s Trevor Crabb and Tri Bourne, seeded ninth, will also make their Challenge debut in Kuşadası. Their only previous Beach Pro Tour appearance was at the Rosarito Elite16 in March. The other two main draw pairs, who will be back on Tour after last participating in Mexico, are Sweden’s David Ahman and Jonatan Hellvig and Austria’s Alexander Huber and Christoph Dressler.

Representatives of another six countries take the remaining six reservations for the main draw. They are Christopher McHugh and Paul Burnett of Australia, Noe Aravena and Vicente Droguett of Chile, Evandro Oliveira and Alvaro Filho of Brazil, Marco Krattiger and Florian Breer of Switzerland, Joao Pedrosa and Hugo Campos of Portugal and Hasan Mermer and Safa Urlu of Turkey.

The list of 32 pairs for the Kuşadası qualifiers is just as impressive. It features the likes of Spain’s Pablo Herrera and Adrian Gavira, Brazil’s Bruno Schmidt and Saymon Barbosa, their compatriots Pedro Solberg and Arthur Mariano, Germany’s Clemens Wickler and Nils Ehlers, Chilean cousins Marco Grimalt and Esteban Grimalt, Doha bronze medalists Martin Ermacora and Moritz Pristauz of Austria and many more.

The qualifier list is headed by the new pairing of two-time Polish Olympian Piotr Kantor with Maciej Rudol, who will finally make their competition debut as a team, after Rudol’s long recovery from a knee surgery.