Canadian men vie for 2nd, final Olympic berth in beach volleyball
Women secure maximum 2 spots entering Hamburg Major
Canada enters Wednesday's Hamburg Major beach volleyball tournament in Germany with two women's spots secured for the Rio Olympics and another in men's, with a chance to add a second by week's end.
The Rio field is comprised of 24 teams per gender, including the top 15 from each on the Olympic ranking as of June 13, and excluding the Brazilians, who are assured one spot per gender as host country and one per gender as 2015 FIVB world champions.
Chaim Schalk and Ben Saxton have had mixed results this season but rank 13th with 4,820 Rio qualifying points, 570 more than Josh Binstock and Sam Schachter, who are 17th with 4,250 points. A third Canadian pair, Sam Pedlow and Grant O'Gorman, is well back with 3,150.
The 35-year-old Binstock finished 17th at the 2012 London Olympics before splitting with partner Martin Reader. Schachter, 26, is his third partner since London and they have shared much success in nearly two-and-a-half years together.
Two weeks ago, they earned their first podium result of the season with a silver medal at the Cincinnati Open to move up from 19th to 17th in the Olympic rankings.
Binstock and Schachter of Richmond Hill, Ont., also finished fifth at the FIVB Fuzhou Open in China in April.
Should they win gold in Hamburg, Binstock and Schachter would have 4,810 points and can overtake German pairs Markus Bockermann and Lars Fluggen and Jonathan Erdmann and Kay Matysik, ranked 14th and 15th, respectively, if those teams don't erase the worst of 12 finishes during the qualifying period.
Schalk and Saxton have secured a top-15 standing for Canada, barring the unforeseen. They warmed up for this week's competition at the Tennis Stadium Hamburg Rothenbaum by winning two of three matches there during the Smart Super Cup on Saturday before forfeiting their final match due to injury. Saxton was dealing with a sore back but is ready to play this week, Schalk told CBCSports.ca on Tuesday.
"Having four teams at the Olympics would be huge for Canada" <a href="https://twitter.com/chaimschalk">@chaimschalk</a> & <a href="https://twitter.com/BenSaxton13">@BenSaxton13</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MoscowGS?src=hash">#MoscowGS</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/VBallCanada">@VBallCanada</a> <a href="https://t.co/rlsFOhVPFh">pic.twitter.com/rlsFOhVPFh</a>
—@FIVBWorldTourSchalk and Saxton's best finish this season was a fifth-place showing in April at the Xiamen Open in China.
Pedlow and O'Gorman have a pair of fifth-place finishes this season, first as the lone Canadian entry in February at the Kish Island Open in Iran and the Cincinnati Open.
On the women's side, Sarah Pavan and Heather Bansley rank third in the Olympic qualifying process, excluding Brazilians, with 6,030 qualifying points coming off their breakout 2015 season that included top-five finishes in nine of 12 World Tour events.
On May 29, they won bronze at the Moscow Grand Slam and placed fifth at the Rio Grand Slam in mid-March.
Jamie Broder and Kristina Valjas have Canada's other women's spot sewn up as the 10th-ranked tandem with 4,640 points. After capturing the first-ever women's FIVB World Tour medal for a Canadian team with a gold at the Fuzhou Open in China last season, they posted two top-10 finishes earlier this season at the Rio Grand Slam and Cincinnati.
Outside looking in
Melissa Humana-Paredes and Taylor Pischke have 3,340 qualifying points but could still be Rio-bound should they fare well this week and at the upcoming Continental Cup events. There's a chance Ed Drakich, director of high performance beach volleyball for Canada and head coach Steven Anderson could select Humana-Paredes and Pischke over the other two pairs even if they have fewer points if they are deemed a better fit for the Olympic competition, which runs Aug. 6-18 at Copacabana Beach.
Besides the top 15, an additional five spots will come from the winners of the Continental Cup competition within the five FIVB confederations: African, Asian, European, NORCECA and South American. Those playoffs are set for the end of June.
The NORCECA Volleyball Federation includes Canada and countries from North and Central America, plus the Caribbean.
The final two spots per gender will be decided July 6-10 when the second and third place finishers from each of the confederations compete at the Continental Cup finals in Sochi, Russia.
Pool play at the Hamburg Major is Wednesday and Thursday. Elimination bracket matches start Friday with three rounds for the women and two rounds for the men.
Saturday's schedule includes the women's semifinals and medal matches while the men's competition ends Sunday.