On the day of meeting with the director of the European Championship Organizing Committee and LVF board member Kaspars Timerman, there are a few days left until the start of the competition. Jurmala is flowing with a strong wind, the sea has already taken a bench and a waste bin in its clamps. Along the grand spectator stand, you can no longer walk on dry feet and it would be even crazier if a small tractor did not push a new wall of sand towards the sea from time to time. The director looks at it very calmly – the margin is still sufficient.
“2017. The sea went so far from the shores that the grandstands had to be strengthened with sandbags. Now we have planned this in advance and a sand embankment has been prepared in advance. The weather forecasters promise spring and a light wind during the week of the European Championship, ”Timermanis calmly looks and whirls in the sand. In order to play beach volleyball on the Dome Square, the organizers had to bring 300 tons of sand. There is nothing to take here in Majori, because there will be enough sand in any case.
“If an area really gets sloping, you can quickly level it with a tractor. You don’t need it yet. The sand is enough and especially during the preparation stage. Even after rain or strong winds, when the surface is blown and the surface becomes harder. The biggest changes on the beach are usually in the spring, when it is transformed by autumn and winter storms or ice freezing. Then the biggest works have to be done in the squares in preparation for the whole summer season, ”reveals the director.
The finest fraction of sand
The richness of Jurmala is its golden sand. There are no more places where beach volleyball is played in the most suitable place – on the beach. In many places, it has moved to city centers, and Hamburg is traditionally home to a tennis arena. “Unique,” says Timerman in one word. Special sand testing was ordered and it turned out that it is the finest fractions in Jurmala. This is probably why only positive reviews have been heard about them. The finer and softer, the better the technical players like such areas. “Our teams definitely have an advantage here. Here we live, train and play. It is our sand, our wind. Things that players are used to on a daily basis, ”Timermanis hopes that the usual environment will help us achieve our goals.
In the European Championship, volleyball will be played on four courts, two more courts are prepared for training. They started on Majori beach on Saturday.
Athletes own “bubble”
The current regulations stipulate that foreign athletes, upon arrival in Latvia, must present a negative Covid-19 virus test performed in the last 72 hours, another will be performed immediately upon arrival, the next – on the fifth day. Athletes will have their own village, their own “bubble”. They will live in the nearby “Baltic Beach Hotel & Spa”, will go to the gaming venue along a certain route along Jūras and Ērgļu streets and will actually be closed from others. In order to meet the requirement that there must be no aisles or cafes between the fields, they will stretch more in the direction of Ķemeri, where beach football was usually played. Once athletes could go to the beach, take pictures with fans, now there will be no such opportunities. Also, the rules of the international federation recommend athletes to stay in the gaming stadium and places with a lot of people as little as possible, it is forbidden to use public transport, ”Timermanis says about the nuances of this competition. This does not mean that it will not be possible to get out of this “bubble” at all – the participants of the European Championship are not forbidden to leave the hotel and go to see, for example, Jomas Street.
Spectators are waiting in the trumpets and in the fan tent
There is a beach area for spectators, and a fan tent with a big screen will be set up next to the big square, so that those who will not be in the stands can follow the events. The total capacity of the stands will be 3000 seats, however, due to the rules restricting the gathering, they may not accommodate more than 600 spectators at a time. The Latvian Volleyball Federation informs that players and spectators must take into account that the requirements will be very strict and will far exceed the limits set by the state.
The first tournament of this level takes place in the second half of September and the last games will end in twilight or even in the dark. Therefore, four light poles are installed around the central square and beach volleyball will be played under artificial lighting. In Latvia, something else happens only in the Saulkrasti cocktail.
The tournament budget has increased to 800 thousand
“There are several things that make this tournament more expensive compared to the World Cup stage held here in Majori last year, which was worth 500 thousand euros. First of all – the prize fund. If a year ago only men played in Jūrmala and distributed 150,000 dollars, then now there will be their own prize fund in both men’s and girls’ tournaments – 100,000 thousand euros each. There are significant additional costs associated with performing Covid-19 tests. The more countries on the red and yellow lists, the more expensive it is for us. Bigger stands, more different fences due to restrictions, more security guards – these are also additional costs. Due to the worst possible weather conditions, everyone involved will also have an extra layer of clothing for rainy and windy weather. About 300 people will be involved in the European Championship, ”reveals the competition director.
Unfortunately, expectations for the arrival of fans from abroad have not been met, which, together with the limited number of spectator seats in the stands, does not allow us to hope for a large income from ticket sales. This European Championship will be more focused on local viewers and TV broadcasts.
The Russian delegation plans to arrive on a tramp
Initially, in the calendar of this season, the World Cup stage was to take place in Jūrmala at the end of May. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the life of beach volleyball also came to a halt, however, the relatively successful situation with us allowed us to put our foot in the almost empty season of falling doors. In April, it became clear that the European Championship would hardly be possible in the Netherlands. Already at that time, the Latvian Volleyball Federation started negotiations with the European Volleyball Confederation (CEV) on the possibility of hosting this tournament. At that time, no one had a clear vision of the future of the virus, but there was hope. In reality, it turned into July, when CEV granted Jurmala the right to host this tournament.
“We can’t have a championship that no one can come to,” says Timermanis about the biggest challenge. The transport sector is moving slowly, with more and more European countries being included in the so-called red and yellow lists.
“We were constantly tossed around with questions – will the tournament really take place, will we be able to return home after that, or will there be flights to the countries on the red list? There was a lot of confusion, it was not possible to book air tickets in time. However, everything has been successfully resolved. Until the last day, the issue of travel was topical for the Russian delegation, which has the third largest team after Latvia and Germany. Most likely, athletes from this country will arrive in Riga on a tramp flight, ”reveals Timermanis.
Whether teams from all countries will be able to come to Jurmala directly determined whether Olympic qualification rating points would be awarded in this European Championship. This is especially important for Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Jānis Šmēdiņš. It is now known – yes, the fight for the Tokyo Olympic tickets will continue in Jūrmala.
Latvian luggage – three titles, five more medals
Latvia will be represented in the European Championship by four and ladies’ men’s teams. After a long time around Tīna Graudiņa’s positive and subsequent several negative Covid-19 tests, it became clear only last weekend that Graudiņa and Anastasia Kravčenoka will be able to fight for the defense of the European championship title won in Moscow last year. By the way, this was only the second time when the Latvians reached medals in the Continental Championship – in 2009, gold was transferred from Sochi by Inguna Minus and Inese Jursone.
In the men’s competition, Latvia has a total of six medals and they are all in the collection of Jānis Šmēdiņš. In 2010, together with Mārtiņš Pļaviņš, he won bronze in Berlin, but the other five were won together with Aleksandrs Samoilovs. These were five finals, of which only one was won in 2015 in Klagenfurt. Silver medals in the neck four times – in 2013 in Klagenfurt, in 2014 in Cagliari, in 2017 in Jurmala and in 2018 in The Hague.
This time the lottery was not very successful for our teams and there will be strong opponents in the group tournament.
In the men’s competition, two-time European champions and world-leading leaders from Norway Andress Mols and Kristians Serums were drawn in Group A together with European former champions Jānis Šmēdiņš and Aleksandrs Samoilovs, as well as northern neighbors from Estonia Kusti Nelvaks and Marta Tīsars and Austrians Aleksandrs Hūbers.
Ardis Bedrītis and Arnis Reliņš received the Russian champions Vyacheslav Krasiļņikovs and Oleg Stojanovskis in Group B. The group also included Poles Peter Kantor and Bartosz Lošjak, once world-leading leaders, as well as the French Kinssiy Ayé and Arno Gotier-Ra.
In Group C, Mikhail Samoilov and Alexander Solovay will be joined by world vice-champions from Germany Julius Tole and Clemens Wickler, multiple world championship medalist and 2015 European Bronze winner Christian Fahrenhorst and Steven van de Velde and Poles Mikhail Brill and Mikolay.
Meanwhile, Mārtiņš Pļaviņš and Edgars Točs in Group D have been drawn by two-time European Championship finalists and 2016 Olympic semi-finalists Konstantin Semyonov and Ilya Leshukov from Russia, 2017 World Championship and Dris Kokelkoren and Tom van Valli, well-known Dutch people in Latvia.
Women Marta Ozolina and Luize Skrastiņa in Group B will be met by Laura Ludviga from Germany, the owner of all possible beach volleyball titles, led by Margareta Kozuha, Jekaterina Birlova and Jevgenija Ukolova from Russia, as well as Mihaela Kubalkova and Mihak Kubičkova from Czech Republic
In Group G, Krista Paegle and Kristīne Briede will have to play with the Dutch – two-time European champion Sanni Kaiser and once-title Madeleine Mepelinka, 2013 world champions Carl Borger and multiple European Championship bronze winners Julie Navanato and Julia Navane from Julia Zudie.
In the F group, the newly baked U-20 European champions Anete Namiķe and Varvara Brailko will meet the 2018 European competition bronze medalists Czech Marku Slukov and Barbor Hermanov, the 2011 European champions Marta Menegati and Victoria Orsi Tota from Italy and the French Alexander Shamero.
Only European champions Tīna Laura Graudiņa and Anastasija Kravčenoka, who were included in Group E from the first basket, were among the relatively lighter opponents – Austrians Lena Pleziučniga and Katarīna Šicenhofere, Russian duo Ksenija Dabiža and Darya Rudiha and Finns Aika Lehton
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