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Last weekend a number of current and ex- City of Bristol Volleyball Club players participated in the First Girls Under-19 Indoor Beach Tournament at Whitchurch Action Indoor Sports Arena. City of Bristol player Stephanie Smith and her partner Natalie Smith won the tournament in a nail-biting final. Details on the event can be found in this article.

The Whitefield International Volleyball Tournament, hosted and organised by the City of Bristol Volleyball Club, has a new website. The tournament is the largest and oldest volleyball event in Britain. This year marks the 34th year of the tournament since it was started in 1973. The website can be found at whitefieldvolleyball.co.uk and hosts a load of information about the tournament including entry instructions, a list of facilities, directions to the venue, as well as results and photos from last year's tournament. Entry booklets for this year's tournament (July 21st-22nd) will be mailed out on April 16th. Make sure to sign up now!

City of Bristol Volleyball Club players featured at an indoor beach volleyball tournament in the new Action Sports Whitchurch Arena on Saturday. Robin Miedzybrodzki and his partner Greg Weaver won the event, which saw eight men's teams on Saturday and eight ladies' teams on Sunday. The pairing of Steffen Paessler and Simone Campostori won a game and came third in their pool of 4, not being helped by having to play against both teams that would eventually play in the final. Clive Jenkins and Dave Lewis battled well, but finished 4th in their pool. The beach court at the Whitchurch Arena is available for hire (£36 for 40 minutes, £30 for members). Booking can be made via the internet at www.actionsportuk.com.

City of Bristol VC players featured prominently at the Southwest Beach Championships in Exmouth. The partnership of Fabio Zulauf and Simone Campostori beat Steffen Paessler and Nick Austin in a gripping final. The championship was dominated by the weather conditions. Strong winds made it very difficult for all players and good technique was essential. All City of Bristol teams made it through the first round in the morning, where 7 of the 15 teams got eliminated. Doing well in the second round, Artur Kwiecinski and James Polkinghorne only narrowly missed out on a place in the semi-finals, losing the decisive game 2:1. Andre Gapinksi and Vladimir Musalimov, who had lost 2:1 to Paessler/Austin in the second round, fought very hard in the semi final against Zulauf/Campostori, drawing 1:1, but losing out on points. Paessler/Austin won their semi-final against a local team and so the stage was set for an all City of Bristol final. It was an exciting game, with Paessler/Austin having the lead in the latter stages of both sets (12:8 and 13:11), but they could not hang on when Zulauf/Campostori finished strongly, winning 16:14 and 17:15.

City of Bristol players had another great weekend on the beach, this time in Weymouth on 29th and 30th July. Rated the biggest UK beach tournament, Men 1 team member Matt Pierce battled his way into the semi-final with his partner Adam Kocic where they faced the Hedlund/Thornton pairing on centre court. Although they fought hard for every point, Matt and co lost to the eventual winners of the men's competition. Former CBVC Women 1 player Kim Smith and her partner Natalie Smith celebrated a centre court appearance in the Under-18s final. It was a close affair, but after a nail-biting deciding set they had to settle for an excellent second place. Steffen Paessler and his partner Nick Austin played in the final of the B-event. Up 14:12 in the final set, they had the win within their grasp. However, a few mistakes cost them dearly and they lost the set 17:15. Andre Gapinski's partner Mike Constantinou was struck by bad luck when he fell ill with a stomach bug and could not play at his best. Nevertheless, they stuck with it, and came in 17th. Overall, it was an enjoyable weekend. The standard of volleyball was high and some of the play on centre court was unbelievable! The next stop of the beach volleyball tour is on Barry Island.

Winning pairs and fours competitions were the jewels in the crown of a great weekend had by thirteen City of Bristol players at the Tenby Beach Volleyball Tournament recently. Fabio and Simone had some close shaves, but came through to win the Men's Division 1 Pairs competition. They stormed to more success with the help of Artur and Steffen, winning the Men's Division 1 Fours. Ian and Tim also enjoyed every minute of their battle to win the Men's Division 2 event. Meanwhile, Lynda and Kate welcomed a steep learning curve as a debut pairing. They made it into the quarter-final of the Women's pairs and joined forces with Steve Ham and Steve Williams to also make the semi-final of the Mixed Fours. Steffen said, "The yearly tournament is very sociable and a wonderful opportunity to play beach volleyball and chill out. The weather was brilliant, but the heat didn't make it easy easy for anyone. It was a fantastic weekend. Come along next year - you won't regret it!" For pictures of the weekend see Steffen's website.

Last weekend capped off the end of a very successful second season for City of Bristol Volleyball Club. The club won a number of honours including being named runners up for the EVA Club of the Year Award at a Golden Jubilee dinner held in Birmingham on Saturday night. The dinner, where CBVC Men 1's Jiri Petrasch was named EVA Player of the Year, celebrated 50 years of volleyball in Britain. The club also enjoyed another successful showing at this year's Southwest Championships. More details can be found here.

The club's favourite firefighter, Danny Munden, has made the news today regarding his fundraising efforts for a trek to the north pole. Danny plays for the City of Bristol Volleyball Club in our Men 2 squad. Click on the photo to read more. There is also an article in the Bristol Evening Post featuring Danny's story.

The City of Bristol Volleyball Club has been shortlisted for the EVA Club of the Year 2006! Congratulations to all members of the club for their hard work this season! Watch this space for the results of the competition.

Actively Recruiting

The City of Bristol Volleyball Club is actively recruiting players and coaches for next season. Motivated by the success of our first men's team this season, the club is raising the bar and looking to challenge for the Division 1 league title next season. If you have played top level volleyball and are looking to play and train with Bristol's best, please contact us.

Although it is not confirmed yet, it is possible that Barry Lovell, our Men's 3 coach, will be unable to coach next season. We are actively recruiting someone to fill this role. Want to join a fun and dynamic organisation? Why not get in touch and see what you can do?

buy.at Fundraising

We have setup a web shop at buy.at in order to raise funds for our club.

The scheme works like this: whenever anything is purchased from one of over 80 online retailers listed in our shop (including play.com, Amazon, M&S, John Lewis, etc.) a sum of around 5% to 10% of the purchase price is donated to us. The only thing that shoppers must do is start their online retail therapy at our web shop. That's it. It doesn't even cost the buyer anything extra!

The shop advertises a number of popular online retailers as well as deals on broadband internet from BT and Virgin, bank accounts from Lloyds and Citibank, holidays and travel specials, motor insurance, and a lot more. So be sure to have a look at our shop before you start your search for anything online!