BEIJING, Aug. 31 (Xinhuanet) -- Following a week of competitions, the world's best beach volleyball players return to Athens when the SWATCH-FIVB World Tour stages the 400,000 US dollars INFOTE Athens Open at the Olympic Beach Volleyball Center.
The event, which starts Tuesday with women's qualifying and ends Sunday with the men's medal matches, will mark the first-time that international beach volleyball competition has returned to the site where Emanuel Rego and Ricardo Santos captured the men's Olympic gold medal for Brazil. Emanuel and Ricardo placed third in last week's SWATCH-FIVB World Tour stop in Montreal where the All- Brazilian Canada Open finale saw Benjamin Insfran and Harley Marques defeat reigning SWATCH-FIVB World Champions Marcio Araujo and Fabio Magalhaes for the gold medal.
The All-Brazilian podium in Montreal also featured the top three-ranked teams on the SWATCH-FIVB World Tour as Marcio Araujo and Fabio hold an 88-point lead over Emanuel and Ricardo (3,856-3,768) on the men's standings with Benjamin and Harley (3,184) after winning their first international title together.
Juliana Felisberta Silva and Larissa Franca continue to pace the women's SWATCH-FIVB World Tour point standings after winning the Canada Open for their fifth gold medal finish this season.
The young Brazilians have all, but clinched the 2005 season point title as they lead Tian Jia and Wang Fei of Chinja by 1,180 points (4,924-3,744).
Greece's Vasso Karadassiou and Vassiliki Arvaniti, the No. 3 women's team on the SWATCH-FIVB World Tour with one gold medalfinish, 2,672 points and $131,000 in earnings, missed lastweek's event to compete in the European Championships where they defeated Rebekka Kadijk and Merel Mooren of the Netherlands in thefinals.
Karadassiou and Arvaniti became the first beach volleyball teamfrom Greece (men or women) to medal on the SWATCH-FIVB World Tour as they claimed a silver medal in Italy before capturing the gold medal in Norway earlier this season in a pair of title matches against Juliana and Larissa.
Both Karadassiou and Arvaniti competed in the Athens Olympic where they both placed ninth with different partners.
While the Greeks were winning the European Championships for women in Moscow Saturday, the men's title was won by Pablo Herrera and Raul Mesa of Spain Sunday where they upset Olympic bronze medalists Patrick Heuscher and Stefan Kobel of Switzerland in the finals.
Herrera captured the Athens Olympic silver medal with Javier Bosma, who is competing this season with Alex Ortiz after Herrera resumed his partnership with Mesa. Herrera and Mesa also won the 2002 SWATCH-FIVB U-21 World Championships.
