Australia’s best volleyballers will head to Bunbury next year for Volley By the Bay’s inaugural round of events.
Three major competitions – the Alcohol Think Again Beach Tour, the Australian Under-23 Beach Championships, and the Australian Junior Beach Championships – will hit Koombana Bay beach from April 21 to 29.
State, national and international competitors will battle it out in the events.
The Beach Tour competition will include AAA-level athletes through to social level players.
The Under-23s event will attract the state’s top players, all vying for Olympic Games selection.
The events will utilise the beach’s 13 planned courts.
It’s going to draw people down to the beach that maybe didn’t know about Bunbury volleyball and the competitions that we have, so we can’t wait.
- Bunbury Volleyball Association president Sue Seymour
Volleyball Western Australia executive director Robyn Kuhl said Bunbury had become a special place for beach volleyball.
“Bunbury is one of the few beaches in WA outside of Scarborough Beach in Perth that actually has enough courts for us to run tournaments of this size,” she said.
“We’re very excited that these competitions go across all of those tiers and levels and I get really excited about having kids playing sports full stop, let alone playing volleyball, so it’s fantastic for both boys and girls...we hope you come down and see that they are having a good time.”
Bunbury Volleyball Association president Sue Seymour said they had around 300 people playing volleyball per week over Summer.
Ms Seymour would love for volleyball players and fans to get involved in next year’s events.
“It’s going to draw people down to the beach that maybe didn’t know about Bunbury volleyball and the competitions that we have, so we can’t wait,” she said.
She said the City of Bunbury, Volleyball WA and Bunbury Volleyball Association have delivered, and will continue to deliver, top-notch volleyball tournaments.
The City of Bunbury provided $25,500 for the project through the Sports Marketing Australia budget.
City of Bunbury Mayor Gary Brennan said the tournaments will make use of the soon-to-be-revitalised Koombana foreshore.
“We’re really proud of the redevelopment that is occurring within Koombana Bay and stage one of transitioning the Bunbury waterfront,” he said.
“We have a whole raft of projects, events, festivals coming to Bunbury starting in November and running all the way through to Easter.
“The City of Bunbury is very pleased to be able to contribute some money to help make this happen, it has enormous social and economic input as well.”
Mr Brennan hoped competitors and their family members were looking forward to visiting Bunbury.
He said the city was proactive in sponsoring major sporting events and bringing new attractions to the region.
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