National team pool slots at stake at BVR nat’l championships

BVR executives Tony Boy Liao, Charo Soriano and Bea Tan. Photo by Celest Colina/INQUIRER

A record number of teams will compete for a slot in the Philippine team pool in the Beach Volleyball Republic On Tour national championships from July 28 to 30 at Aguib Beach in Sta. Cagayan.

From just 16 last year, the number of tandem teams in the national championship has doubled to 32—a testament to the growth of the sport which the executives of BVR have been aiming for.

“Number one metric of growth is increasing the number of tandem teams and another is [having] men’s and women’s events instead of just single gender,” said BVR founder Charo Soriano in a presser Tuesday at Delimondo Cafe.

The stakes are also higher this year as the top three teams from each division will get slots in the beach volleyball national team pool from which the squad for the Southeast Asian Beach Games in September will come from, as supported by Larong Volleyball sa Pilipinas Inc.

For both the men’s and women’s divisions, the 16 teams will be broken down into four pools for a single-round robin format. The top two from each pool will play the other top teams in a crossover eliminations before moving on the semifinals and the finals.

The beach volleyball action will happen across three days on the powdery white sand beach of Anguib at the tip of the northeastern part of Luzon.

Bea Tan, who is also a co-founder of the BVR, expects tougher competition in this year’s national finals, which is a culmination of seven BVR legs where they saw the potential of beach volleyball players from all over the country.

“Very competitive teams from the provinces will come to Anguib to compete,” she said.

Soriano said they have yet to finalize the list of competitors but some who have confirmed are FEU, Dipolog, Coast Guard, NU, Bacolod, Iloilo, Cebu, RTU, La Salle Bacolod, Ateneo, Navy, at Coast Guard for the Men’s division, and RTU, Ateneo, Iloilo, Cebu, Bacolod, Tagum, PNP, at Perlas for the Women’s division.

Aside from a chance to represent the Philippines in international competition, the champion will take home P50, 000 while the runner up and third place will settle for P30,000 and P15,000, respectively.