Surfing created the expression ‘Brazilian Storm’ to highlight the large representation the South American country had in some of its top international events and beach volleyball could very well borrow it for this week’s Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Elite16 tournament in Uberlandia.

After the completion of Wednesday’s qualifier, the host country accounts for 15 (nine women’s and six men’s) of the 32 teams that will compete in Thursday’s main draw. That’s the most duos from the same nation registered in a single event since the start of the Beach Pro Tour.

· Watch all matches at the Beach Pro Tour Elite16 event in Uberlandia live on Volleyball TV.

The 16 teams in each gender were split into four pools and will start their main draw campaigns on Thursday, at 8:00 local time (5:00 GMT) – 24 matches are set to take place on the first day of the main phase. The first two days will be played in a round-robin format and the two best-ranked duos in each pool will move forward to the elimination rounds.

The quarterfinals and the semifinals at the popular multisport club Praia Clube will be played on Saturday, with the medal matches concluding the first Elite16 event in South America on Sunday.

Uberlandia Elite16 - Match Schedule and Results

Brazil’s main draw representation increased by two teams on Wednesday as Arthur Mariano/Adrielson dos Santos and Pedro Solberg/Arthur Lanci overcame the qualifier in Uberlandia. The other two men’s teams to advance were Uruguay’s Hans Hannibal/Marco Cairus and Türkiye’s Safa Urlu/Hasan Mermer.

Set to make their first main draw appearance in an Elite16 event, Arthur and Adrielson, who competed in Challenge tournaments in Tlaxcala and Itapema earlier this season, advanced with a dramatic three-set (23-21, 17-21, 15-7) victory over the English Bello twins Joaquin and Javier.

“The English team are very good,” Adrielson reacted. “Both of them are physically strong and great offensive players, so we knew that having our blocking and our defense well-adjusted would be important. We started a little nervous, but then settled and were able to play a good match. We’re now looking forward to tomorrow.”

The four teams that emerged from the qualifier were allocated to main draw pools. Arthur and Adrielson will join Brazil’s Vitor Felipe/Renato Lima, Norway’s Hendrik Mol/Mathias Berntsen and Austria’s Martin Ermacora/Moritz Pristauz in Pool A with Hannibal and Cairus completing Pool B alongside Norway’s Anders Mol/Christian Sørum, Austria’s Robin Seidl/Philipp Waller and Chile’s Vicente Droguett/Noe Aravena.

Urlu and Mermer will compete with Brazil’s Andre Loyola/George Wanderley, Austria’s Julian Hörl/Alexander Horst and Argentina’s Nicolas Capogrosso/Tomas Capogrosso in Pool C. Pedro Solberg and Arthur Lanci went to Pool D, which already featured Brazil’s Bruno Schmidt/Saymon Barbosa and Evandro Goncalves/Vinicius Freitas and Mexico’s Juan Virgen/Miguel Sarabia.

With 16 teams entered for the women’s event, there was no need for a qualifier and all four pools are set. Pool A will be the first in Beach Pro Tour history to be formed by four teams from the same country – Brazil’s Eduarda ‘Duda’ Lisboa/Ana Patricia Ramos, Talita Antunes/Thamela Coradello, Maria Elisa Antonelli/Fernanda Berti and Ana Luiza Mohr/Carol Horta.

Pool B has Brazil’s Barbara Seixas/Carol Salgado and Josemari ‘Josi’ Alves/Carol Goerl, Finland’s Taru Lahti-Liukkonen/Niina Athiainen and USA’s Megan Kraft/Emily Stockman while Brazil’s Andressa Cavalcanti/Vitoria Rodrigues, Japan’s Miki Ishii/Sayaka Mizoe and Suzuka Hashimoto/Reika Murakami and Chile’s Maria Francisca Rivas/Chris Vorpahl are in Pool C.

Pool D will have USA’s Terese Cannon/Sarah Sponcil, Brazil’s Taiana Lima/Hegeile ‘Hege’ Santos and Taina Bigi/Victoria Lopes and Japan’s Asami Shiba/Takemi ‘Take’ Nishibori.

Quick links:
Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Uberlandia Elite16
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