Photo by Tristan Tamayo/INQUIRER.net
MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines is set to host an FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour 1-star event with Beach Volleyball Republic organizing a double-gender tournament in Boracay from May 23 to 26.
The tournament has attracted a total of 20 women’s and 28 men’s teams from 17 countries with 11 pairs coming from the Philippines.
This will also feature the reunion of the indomitable pairing of Cherry Rondina and Bernadeth Pons who won two straight Philippine Super Liga beach volleyball titles and once represented the Philippines in the 29th Southeast Asian Beach Volleyball Championships.
Other Philippine teams in the women’s division are the pairings of Dij Rodriguez & Bea Tan, Jackie Estoquia & DM Demontaño, and Fiola Ceballos and Patty Orendain.
Babylove Barbon—Rondina’s last teammate in University of Santo Tomas in the UAAP Season 81 beach volleyball tournament—and Gen Eslapor will go through the qualifiers.
Air Force’s Ranran Abdilla and Jesse Lopez will head the men’s teams that also include then partnerships of James Buytrago & Krung Arbasto, and Mike Abria & Jade Becaldo.
Tan and Rodriguez have won three BVR on Tour legs this year while Barbon and Eslapor ruled Dumaguete in April.
Abdilla and Lopez won the first three legs this season in the men’s division before Abria and Becaldo won in Lingayen.
The Philippines’ first foray into the FIVB beach volleyball circuit in 2018 when it hosted the Beach World Tour with the partnership of Rondina and Gervacio finishing fifth—the highest the country got.