In what promises to be a another landmark, memorable event in the history of the Fédération Internationale de Volleyball (FIVB) the 11th FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships in Austria will be held July 28-August 6. While Klagenfurt, Austria has hosted 32 FIVB international events, this will be the first FIVB international event held in Vienna.
With a total of 96 teams (48 in each gender), teams will be competing for part of a $1 million purse as Austria hosts an FIVB international event for the 19th time for men and 15th time for women.
A total of 32 previous FIVB World Tour events have all been staged in the Klagenfurt (18 men’s events, 14 women).
Through the last event in 2016, Austria has hosted a total of 32 FIVB World Tour events (18 men, 14 women-all in Klagenfurt) during a 18-year period with Brazil leading the medal count in both genders. The 2001 event in Klagenfurt was the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships.
In the men’s totals in Austria, Brazil has 26 medals, followed by the USA with nine, Germany with five, Netherlands and Norway with three each, Switzerland with two and with one men’s medal each in Austria are Argentina, Australia, Canada, Italy, Latvia and Russia.
After 14 FIVB World Tour women’s events held in Austria through the 2016 event, Brazil leads the medal parade with 18 total medals followed by the USA with 11, Germany with five, China with four, Netherlands and Switzerland with two each and with one women’s medal in Austria are Czech Republic, Russia and Ukraine.
Anchored in The Hague, the 2015 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships were held in four cities in the Netherlands--Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Apeldoorn and at the headquarters in the Hague. Winning the men’s gold medal was Brazil’s Alison Cerutti/Bruno Oscar Schmidt and capturing the women’s gold medal was Brazil’s Agatha Bednarczuk/Barbara Seixas.
In the 2013 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships held in Stare Jablonki, Poland, winning the men’s gold medal was the Dutch duo of Alexander Brouwer/Robert Meeuwsen while claiming the women’s gold was China’s Chen Xue/Xi Zhang.
In 10 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships, Brazil leads the men’s gold medal parade with six and the other four countries with one men’s gold medal each art teams from Argentina, Germany, Netherlands and the United States. In women’s gold medals, Brazil has won five gold medals, the United States has won four and China won the other women’s gold.
Prior to this year’s FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships in Austria, previous world championships have been held in the United States (Los Angeles, 1997), France (Marseille,1999), Austria (Klagenfurt, 2001), Brazil (Rio de Janeiro, 2003), Germany (Berlin, 2005), Switzerland (Gstaad, 2005), Norway (Stavanger, 2009), Italy (Rome, 2011), Poland (Stare Jablonki, 2013) and the Netherlands (The Hague-Amsterdam-Apeldoorn-Rotterdam, 2015).