Welch, Older and Wiser, Takes Serious Approach : Volleyball: He has cut out the thrills of skiing to focus on training that will produce success on the beach tour.

Wes Welch runs the words through his mind every morning.

Nutrition.

Strength.

Focus.

Three simple words that remind him that every time he steps on the beach, he’s there for work, not play.

Such is the job description of a pro beach volleyball player.

“I need that focus on volleyball,” he said, “instead of focusing on some of the extracurricular activities like skiing and partying.”

It’s an odd reminder for a 34-year-old man, but one Welch uses daily.

After playing professionally in Switzerland for four years, Welch made a big impact on the beach tour as a rookie in 1991, upsetting three top-ranked teams with a variety of partners.

But his dedication to volleyball was rivaled by a passion for skiing and snowboarding. It took a painful moment on the Mammoth ski slopes last February, as well as a tough off-season conditioning program, to set his priorities.

Welch has a history of problems with his right knee, but when he fell off his skis at Mammoth, he strained ligaments in his left knee and ankle.

“It had snowed for a week and it was chest-deep,” Welch said. “Then the sun came out and set the snow up pretty tight--Sierra Cement, they call it--and it was so thick that I couldn’t turn my ski and I fell.”

Fortunately for Welch, his knee and ankle didn’t require surgery.

Thanks to an off-season weight and conditioning program developed by his wife, Kelly, Welch was able to play--although not 100%--when the Assn. of Volleyball Professionals’ tour started in March.

“Kelly had been training me down at San Clemente Gym,” said Welch, a former Laguna Beach High and USC standout. “It was hard core and I was really getting into it. I was in the weight room six days a week in the off-season and I added 15 pounds in the off-season.

“That work made me stronger and faster, and I think it helped me (recover from) my injuries (quicker).”

Still, the injuries cost Welch six weeks of valuable training time entering the season, and delayed his teaming with Tanner.

“Just before I got hurt,” Welch said, “I played well (with partner Andrew Smith), at the Evian qualifying tournament here at Manhattan Beach.

“Troy and I were talking about playing together as soon as the season started, but after I got hurt, I was out six weeks prior to the start of the season, and that fell through.”

Tanner is Welch’s San Clemente neighbor. They had played well together against San Clemente’s Karch Kiraly and Pacific Palisades’ Kent Steffes, the tour’s top-ranked team, in practice matches at Capistrano Beach.

“Troy and I knew we could beat anybody out here,” Welch said. “We match up well with just about anyone.”

Tanner opened the season playing with Culver City’s Dan Vrebalovich, and Welch teamed with Smith, a model and younger brother of Sinjin Smith.

“Andrew and I were competitive,” Welch said. “We had a couple ninth-place finishes. I was only about 60 or 70%. Then, when I got to be 100%, Troy and I finally got together.”

Tanner and Welch played their first tournament together May 6-8 in Dallas, and they shocked everybody on the tour by finishing second to Kiraly-Steffes.

That tournament set the table for the next month.

Welch and Tanner were third at Phoenix behind Kiraly-Steffes and Randy Stoklos-Adam Johnson, dropped to 13th in San Jose, then came back a week later with a second-place finish behind Johnson-Stoklos at San Francisco.

Suddenly, Welch was enjoying unprecedented success with the partner he had always wanted.

“Wes and I work well together because both of us do a lot of things well,” Tanner said. “Lately, we’ve been struggling a little bit, and I think we need to be more focused.”

Focus. Now there’s a familiar word in Welch’s vocabulary. Wasn’t that something he and Tanner were working on?

“Yes, but we still get distracted a little bit,” Tanner said. “It’s nothing big, just like letting a bad call by an official affect us. Or hanging out with friends too long at a tournament. Everyone wants five or 10 minutes with us now because we’ve had some success. We have to learn to turn it on and off.”

It’s certainly new to Welch. The tour’s rookie of the year in 1991, he played with a variety of partners, including Laguna Beach’s Leif Hanson, San Clemente’s Larry Mear and Santa Monica’s Mark Eller, over the next two seasons.

Welch’s best finish was a third in 1991 with Eller, and he had never consistently finished in the top five--until Tanner came along.

“It has been a little frustrating since we’ve hooked up,” Welch said, “because there’s a lot of pressure playing with Troy and we feel we that if we’re not in the winner’s circle every week, it’s a disappointment.

“Troy takes losing hard, but you have to realize that nobody is there (in the finals) every week, except for Karch and Kent. You just can’t get bummed out about a loss.”

Not when the prize money keeps rolling in.

Welch has earned $36,523 so far this season, by far his best since playing indoors in Switzerland. Having played in a couple of TV matches, Welch picked up Speedo as a sponsor to go along with Hobie sunglasses.

At 34, Welch is one of the older players on the tour, but not the oldest. On an early July day when Sinjin Smith, 35, was playing one of his final matches at the Manhattan Beach Open, Welch observed that being thirtysomething in a sport of twentysomethings isn’t so bad.

Sitting a few yards away from Welch in the players’ tent is former Laguna Beach High standout Dain Blanton, fresh off his senior season at Pepperdine. Blanton recently joined the beach tour full time.

Laguna Beach senior Dan Styles, 17, playing his first major tournament as an amateur, stops by to say hello.

“Go get ‘em Danny,” Welch yells.

Styles smiles.

“He’s great,” Welch says. “He reminds me a lot of Karch when he was in high school. He hits the ball hard. He just goes after it.”

“I’m glad to see them (Blanton and Styles) out here. You see them winning here or there. Pretty soon they’ll be regulars out here.

“Guys like them look at me and see a guy reaching his prime at 34. They have to be stoked about that, knowing they have more than 10 years to play.”

Welch pauses, then ponders another question.

He wonders who was the oldest player to win his first pro tournament. Will it be him?

Officially, it’s a record the AVP doesn’t keep, but it’s one that veteran volleyball observers think would be Welch’s if he wins a tournament.

“I would love to play another five years,” Welch said. “Ron Von Hagen won a tournament (not his first) when he was 38, and that’s what I’m shooting for.”

On the Move

Before 1994, Wes Welch’s best finish on the Assn. of Volleyball Professionals’ beach tour was a third with Mark Eller in 1991. But since joining San Clemente neighbor Troy Tanner in early May, Welch has four top-four finishes. A look at Welch’s 1994 season:

Tournament Partner Finish AVP qualifier (Manhattan Beach) Andrew Smith 9th Boca Raton, Fla. Smith 13th Ft. Myers, Fla. Smith 9th Miami Smith 17th Clearwater, Fla. Smith 7th Jacksonville, Fla. Smith 17th Atlanta Smith 7th Dallas Troy Tanner 2nd Phoenix Tanner 3rd San Jose Tanner 13th San Francisco Tanner 2nd Grand Haven, Mich. Tanner 9th Boulder, Colo. Tanner 8th Milwaukee Tanner 4th Baltimore Tanner 17th Manhattan Beach Tanner 7th

Source: Assn. of Volleyball Professionals