Bryl and Łosiak up in fifth at the Olympic Ranking after Gstaad fourth-place

Few things will be more important in international beach volleyball in the next 12 months than qualifying for the Paris 2024 Olympics. The race to be a part of sports’ greatest event is always fascinating and generates endless interesting storylines involving the top teams in the world. We will be following the Olympic qualification process throughout the entire period and will also present some articles that will help you understand how it works and introduce you to some of the stars of the sport that will be chasing something special on their Road to Paris.

Last weekend’s Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Elite16 event in Gstaad may not have ended as Michal Bryl and Bartosz Łosiak wanted, as the Polish were forced to abandon the bronze medal match due to an injury, but their semifinal appearance in the Swiss Alps strengthened their position in the FIVB Olympic Rankings.

The rankings, which will determine 17 of the 24 teams that will compete in next year’s Paris Olympics, are formed by the total points earned by teams considering their best 12 results in international and continental tournaments played until June 10, 2024, when the 17 best-ranked men’s and women’s teams will secure a spot in the Games.

The two, who have been at the Tokyo Olympics with different partners, made the trip to Switzerland in seventh place and returned home in fifth after they elevated their points total to 4,000 with the 900 they earned for their fourth-place finish in the event.

Norwegians Anders Mol and Christian Sørum, who took silver at the Gstaad Elite16, also have reasons to celebrate as the Beach Volley Vikings added 1,100 points to their total, bringing it up to 5,700 and improving their advantage to second-placed Brazilians Andre Loyola and George Wanderley (5,360), who won bronze in the event, by 100 points in comparison to prior the start of the tournament.

Because they didn’t play in Gstaad due to an injury, reigning European champions David Åhman and Jonatan Hellvig of Sweden maintained their points total at 4,280, being passed by Brazilians Evandro Gonçalves and Arthur Lanci (4,360), and now rank fourth.

FIVB Men’s Olympic Rankings

European teams currently occupy six of the remaining 12 spots to Paris 2024 offered via the Olympic Rankings with Germany’s Nils Ehlers/Clemens Wickler (sixth – 3,880 points), Italy’s Adrian Carambula/Alex Ranghieri (eighth – 3,740), Spain’s Pablo Herrera/Adrián Gavira (ninth – 3,680), Austria’s Julian Hörl/Alexander Horst (13^th – 3,340) and the Netherlands’ Alexander Brouwer/Robert Meeuwsen (14^th – 3,340) and Steve van de Velde/Matthew Immers (15^th – 3,300).

Among the women, the only European team to make it to the semifinals in Gstaad, Germans Cinja Tillmann and Svenja Müller, have finally broken into the top-17 – the two sat out of some events earlier in the season and have only four finishes considered while most of their opponents have six or more.

With the 900 points amassed with their fourth-place finish in the Swiss Alps, the bronze medalists of last year’s FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship are now in 16th place with 2,880 points – they appear in 21^st in the list, but as Brazil have five teams and the USA have four inside the qualification zone and each country can only qualify two teams, the spots are given to the next eligible duos.

At the top of the standings, Europe was able to maintain four teams inside the top ten in the list – Switzerland’s Zoé Vergé-Dépré/Esmée Böbner (seventh – 3,980 points), Latvia’s Tina Graudina/Anastasija Samoilova (eighth – 3,900), Italy’s Marta Menegatti/Valentina Gottardi (ninth – 3,780) and the Netherlands’ Raisa Schoon/Katja Stam (tenth – 3,760).

FIVB Women’s Olympic Rankings

Four other teams from the continent are also inside the qualification zone in Finland’s Taru Lathi/Niina Ahtiainen (12^th – 3,360), Switzerland’s Tanja Hüberli/Nina Brunner (13^th – 3,220), Czechia’s Barbora Hermannová/Marie-Sara Štochlová (15^th – 2,900) and Spain’s Liliana Fernández/Paula Soria (17^th – 2,800).

A new update on the Olympic Rankings will be released next week, following the conclusion of the Challenge tournament in Espinho, Portugal, on Sunday.