Xiamen, China, April 19, 2018 - Lithuania's Monika Povilaityte and Ieva Dumbauskaite are through to the 2018 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour Xiamen Open main draw, entering Xiamen after being crowned inaugural European Snow Volleyball champions.
Quick links - FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour:
Xiamen - WebsiteXiamen - Schedule and ResultsXiamen - Tournament NotesDumbauskaite/Povilaityte took the Snow Volleyball title in Wagrain-Kleinarl and Flachau, Austria in March, before concentrating on the beach volleyball season.
“In Lithuania we don’t have a lot of competitions and our federation encouraged us to join the snow volleyball because we are a small country and why not? We have fun.
“First of all it’s slippery on snow and the second thing is shoes and it’s more difficult to run. If you are not good in receiving and passing you are done. In beach you can run to the whole court, but in the snow, you can only run a couple of steps,” said Dumbauskaite.
“We played snow volleyball and we won that tour, it was crazy, but after that we had a beach camp in Turkey for two weeks with the Ukrainian team, that’s why we were prepared for this tournament,” said Dumbauskaite.
Ieva Dumbauskaite (left) and Monika Povilaityte from Lithuania against Katharina Schützenhöfer from Austria at the net The pair closed out two tie-break matches to secure a spot in the main draw, their second round qualification match a tense back and forth against Lena Plesiutschnig and Katharina Schutzenhofer from Austria, 2-1 (19-21, 21-16, 19-17).
“I’m super exited, my partner started crying, I just don’t have words because the last three or four World Tour events, we lost in qualification or in main draw, really close matches and I told myself when it was like 15-15, no not this time, not anymore,” said Dumbauskaite.