Austria’s top team Schützenhöfer/Plesiutschnig announce retirement

After spending as many as twelve years involved in elite sport, Austria’s Beach Volleyball top players Katharina Schützenhöfer and Lena Plesiutschnig have announced their retirement. The two athletes from Styria look back on a successful journey. Together they celebrated many successes, including several national and international tournament victories, medals, top 5 and top 10 finishes at major events and made it into the top 20 of the FIVB World Ranking. 

For years, Schützenhöfer/Plesiutschnig have represented Austria’s number 1 women’s duo and helped shape Austrian Beach Volleyball. Despite injuries and setbacks, the two 31-year-olds always fought back. 

“Now it is time for a new phase in life. We both have many other interests and goals,” explain Schützenhöfer and Plesiutschnig in unison. While playing at the highest level, the two completed a master’s degree and are now looking forward to new professional challenges. They do not rule out remaining involved in Volleyball though in one form or another. 

Schützenhöfer: “We have mastered so many highs and some lows together and I am incredibly proud of everything we have achieved. Beach Volleyball is my great passion, and I am incredibly grateful that I was able to turn my hobby into my profession. I look back on 24 years of Volleyball, starting indoors, where I also celebrated many successes, through several years in which I worked both on the sand and in the hall and we celebrated our first major successes as a team, to the twelve years of professional Beach Volleyball, during which we won several medals and achieved many successes. Above all, reaching the round of 16 at the Vienna Major 2019 and the silver medal at the Challenge in the Maldives will remain in my memory forever. It was a long and beautiful journey that is now coming to an end. I would like to thank everyone who accompanied me on this journey from the bottom of my heart.”

Plesiutschnig: “I am taking with me an incredible number of wonderful memories - it was an incredibly cool time, but also full of challenges that have shaped me. I am proud of everything we have achieved together and, above all, grateful that I was able to experience all of this. Volleyball was my first great passion until I discovered Beach Volleyball - and then everything happened quite quickly. The fact that I was able to pursue my hobby as a professional for twelve years is a huge privilege for which I am infinitely grateful. A huge thank you goes to everyone who accompanied and supported me on this journey: to Kathi, to our support team, our sponsors, funding agencies, the Federation, my family, and my boyfriend. Without you, this journey would not have been possible. It now feels just right to close this chapter, and I am looking forward to the new tasks and challenges that lie ahead of me.” 

The Austrians did have their breakthrough in age-group competitions – back in 2011, they won gold at the U20 European Championships and claimed silver at the U19 World Championships. Two years later, they won a bronze medal at the U21 World Championships. In 2015, Kathi and Lena won a silver medal at the inaugural European Games held in Baku, Azerbaijan, where they only lost to Switzerland’s Nina Betschart and Nicole Eiholzer in the final. More recently, in 2022, they finished second at the FIVB Challenger in the Maldives and last year they helped Austria finish third at the CEV Nations Cup Final in Jurmala, Latvia. They played their last tournament as a team in late 2024 in Nuvali, Philippines, where they finished in seventh place.