Rome main draw under way – The iconic event returns to the World Tour
When the organizers of the World Tour Finals at Rome’s Foro Italico describe their vision for beach volleyball events in Italy, it goes along the lines of “Let’s make Rome great again”. The World Tour Finals that start with main draw today are the kick-off for a series of beach volleyball events hosted in Rome. Highlight will be the Beach Volleyball World Championships in 2021 that are a major part of the joint 2019-2022 strategy from the FIVB, the Italian Volleyball Federation (FIPAV) and the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI). The goal of the initiative is to develop beach volleyball in Italy and bring iconic beach volleyball events to the country each year. And even more. Rome is selected to be a laboratory to grow beach volleyball on a global basis.
The Foro Italico is famous for its annual ATP tennis event and therefore tennis is the analogy on how the concept could look like. Despite the reference to tennis, this year’s action does not occur on the tennis centre court but in a temporary construction that features some references to ancient Roman arenas. With a capacity of 6.000 spectators, it is smaller than the tennis stadium. In 2011 when Rome hosted the World Championships for the last time, centre court action took place in the tennis stadium with a capacity of 10.000. But after hosting the last FIVB event in 2013 already, Rome needs to re-establish beach volleyball in the Italian capital. The organizers assure that for the 2021 World Championships that will be played at the same time of the year as the World Tour Finals, the action will return to the grand centre court in the tennis stadium. Just like a real gladiators’ arena…
Foro Italico’s gallery features historic winners
Check out today’s matches and results on the official event page. The matches will also be livestreamed on Youtube.
