Canadians Pavan, Humana-Paredes into Gstaad beach volleyball quarters
Duo won the world championship earlier this month
World champions Sarah Pavan of Kitchener, Ont., and Melissa Humana-Paredes of Toronto have advanced to quarter-finals of the five-star Beach Volleyball Gstaad tournament in Switzerland.
The Canadian team, also defending Gstaad champions, beat Tina Graudina and Anastasija Kravcenoka of Latvia 2-0 (21-16, 21-17) on Friday and will next face Ana Patricia Ramos and Rebecca Silva of Brazil on Saturday.
"It was a tough match against a strong young Latvian team. We were able to manage the pace of the game well with our serving, something we'll need to really utilize against our next opponents," said Humana-Paredes.
The Brazilians advanced to the quarterfinals with a 2-0 (21-16, 21-15) win over the Canadian team of Brandie Wilkerson and Heather Bansley.
Pavan and Humana-Paredes are coming off their world championship win last week in Hamburg.
In men's action, Canada's Sam Pedlow and Sam Schachter finished ninth after losing to Czechs Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner.