Volleyball Pros Return Home for $75,000 Venice Open Tournament

After playing more than a third of the professional beach volleyball season in such unlikely locales as Dallas, Phoenix and New Orleans, the tour returns home this weekend for the $75,000 Venice Open.

Once a strictly Southern California phenomenon offering its top players little more than sun and status, the professional beach volleyball tour now consists of 29 tournaments with $1.9 million in prize money. The winning two-man team will divide $17,250 in the Venice Open, which begins at 8:30 a.m. Saturday and ends with the championship match at 3 p.m. Sunday on the sand north of Venice Pier.

The growth on the sport began with the formation in 1983 of the Assn. of Volleyball Professionals, which brought wealthy sponsors, big money and national cable television coverage to the beach. And the tour has brought the beach--by the truckload--to landlocked cities whose only previous exposure to the game had been soft drink and beer commercials.

“We’ve played in horrendous dirt, construction sand, some far from ideal circumstances,” said Mike Dodd, who with his partner, Tim Hovland, form the leading team in the AVP money rankings. Both have earned $58,000 to date, winning three tournaments.

Although Dodd says Southern California “has the best crowds, the best beaches and is the best place to play in the world,” the 6-foot-4 El Segundo resident, who learned the game on the hallowed sands of Manhattan Beach, sees value in the long trips to Cleveland, Milwaukee and Rochester, N.Y.

“We see ourselves as pioneers, taking our sport all over the country,” Dodd said. “It’s really unbelievable. When we go to a new site, the first year the crowd will be sparse. Then the next year, the same people will be back, they’ve told their friends and there will be a bigger crowd. The big payoff is watching the excitement grow in an area that had never seen the game before.”

Going into the Venice Open, Sinjin Smith and Randy Stoklos, last year’s champions and the most successful team in beach volleyball history, are even with Dodd-Hovland in tournament victories (three) but trail in the money rankings with $45,687 each.

Karch Kiraly is also back on the beach after taking last summer off to play for the U.S. Olympic team.