2008 Olympic Gold Medalists

2008 Olympic Gold Medalists
(click on picture to see larger picture)

Saturday, April 30, 2011

Shanghai 2011

Leave for Shanghai tomorrow. See if we can't keep rolling from Brasil. Looks like it might be a bit wet while we are there. Get to see my brother who lives in Japan. He is coming over with his wife to check out the tourney. Should be nice.

Thursday, April 28, 2011

USA Today Honors Dalhausser and Rogers

4_22_dalhausser_and_rogers_w_medals
Photo: Courtesy of the FIVB
Phil Dalhausser, left, and Todd Rogers pose with their gold medals after the Brasilia Open.
 
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (April 27, 2011) – USA Today has named Phil Dalhausser (Ormond Beach, Fla.) and Todd Rogers (Santa Barbara, Calif.) its Olympic Athletes of the Week after the duo won the 2011 Brasilia Open, the first event on the 2011 SWATCH FIVB World Tour.
Dalhausser and Rogers, the reigning Olympic champions, won nine gold medals on the 2010 FIVB World Tour. The 2011 Brasilia Open marked their 38th event together on the international circuit. They have won 18 gold medals and played in 30 semifinal rounds.
Sunday’s finale was the 49th FIVB World Tour men’s gold medal match featuring Brazilian and American teams. With the victory, the United States now leads 25-24 in this gold medal rivalry.
The pair will be back in action at the Shanghai China Jinshan Open on May 2-8.
To read the USA Today article, click here.

Dalhausser, Rogers win Brasilia Open, earn honor

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/olympics/2011-04-26-athlete-of-the-week26_N.htm

The top-ranked beach volleyball duo of Phil Dalhausser and Todd Rogers won the first event of the 2011 SWATCH FIVB world tour, the Brasilia Open. They defeated Brazil's Alison Cerutti and Emanuel Rego in the gold-medal match, 21-18, 21-13 in 35 minutes to win.
It was the second time in the tournament that Rogers and Dalhausser, the reigning Olympic champions, defeated Cerutti and Rego. They also won in the fourth round (16-21, 21-19, 15-11).
Dalhausser and Rogers won nine gold medals on the tour last year. They are USA TODAY's Olympic Athletes of the Week.

Todd Rogers, left, and Phil Dalhausser react after winning the Otera Open men's final  last August in Kristiansand, Norway.

By Tor Erik Schroder, AFP/Getty Images
Todd Rogers, left, and Phil Dalhausser react after winning the Otera Open men's final last August in Kristiansand, Norway.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Brasilia W

War of Attrition. That is essentially what Brasilia became the longer a team moved on in the tournament. Simply put: It was hot, hot and hot. If you were fortunate enough to be playing on an outer court than you had the luxury of a nice breeze to cool you down in the roughly 90 degree heat. If you were inside center court, there was no breeze to be found. They wrap the stadium with a fabric that doesn't let the wind through. Combine that with a packed house of crazy screaming brazilian fans and the heat index rises considerably. So as the game progresses on center court, every play gets more and more difficult. Every sideout gets a little tougher. Every rally becomes exhausting. Who can rise out of the sand on the next play after a 30 second rally in the previous play. Add in the dry desert heat and you are at 3,000 feet, not at sea level, and your lungs are sucking for air after anything that is not a pass, set and putaway.

Still fun to win though. The tournament itself is usually the toughest of the year since it is the first one of the year and it is in Brasil and you have more than 3 or 4 Brasilian teams. This was no different with 7 Brasilian teams this year. Add in 5 American teams and that is a tough tourney.

The tourney itself was a good test for Phil and I. Our first round game vs. Chile was easy. I think they were a bit overwhelmed. First time in the draw for them I believe. Second round was our toughest test vs. the Brasilian team from Georgia. We survived one match point when Phil received the ball with us down 14-13 in the third and shot a deep angle shot over the blocker's head for a kill. Won that won 18-16 I believe. Next day we played Spain and Emanuel/Alison. Spain smoked us in game 1 and I was struggling. Had an upset belly all tourney long for some reason. Not sure why. Game 2 we turned it around with some tough jump float serving. Both Phil and I were float serving as at that altitude it is tough for Phil to consistantly get his jump serve in. We were down 15-13 in game 2 but then went on a 6-1 run powered by tough serves and kept the momentum through game three. Emanuel/Alison were similar to the Spaniards. We got smoked in game 1 but came back strong in game 2 with a good push at the end. Barn burner in game 3 until about 10-10. I think Alison ran out of gas in a very hot game in center court as Phil stuffed him twice and he hit out twice. In the semis we played Marcio and Ricardo. Normally a very tough game but they were cooked. They played that morning vs. Nick and Matt and our American compatriots wore them down for us. Thanks guys. Marcio was cooked and Ricardo wasn't much better. Our game on center court was again very hot and they just didn't have it in them. We won 16 and 13 I think.

The finals were a rematch of the winners semis and a very high level first game. Both teams siding out pretty good. We got up in the end though and won 21-18 in the first. In the second Emanuel/Alison ran out of gas. Lot of setting errors, hitting errors and Phil was really big at the net. I think I only dug a handful of balls but when you are mostly serving Alison it is either a kill, block or error as the guy is an absolute monster of a hitter. I think I dug one hard driven ball of his and it went up about 100 feet in the air. Think a slightly smaller version of George Romain. Like 6'8 and 250 pounds rather than 6'7 and 270 pounds. A big man to say the least.

Always good to win on Brasilian soil in front of their fans. Phil and I have done it twice in a row and I must say it feels pretty good.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

USA’s Phil Dalhausser and Todd Rogers win men’s gold medal at Brasília Open

Brasília, Brazil, April 23, 2011—In a rematch of last year’s gold medal match, top-seeded Phil Dalhausser/Todd Rogers of the United States defeated Brazil’s fifth-seeded Alison Cerutti/Emanuel Rego Saturday in the internationally-televised men’s finale that concluded the US$380,000 Brasília Open, the season-opening event on the 2011 FIVB Beach Volleyball Swatch World Tour calendar. Dalhausser/Rogers defeating their Brazilian rivals in two sets, 21-18, 21-13 in a 35-minute championship match.
With the victory, USA’s Dalhausser/Rogers won their 18th FIVB gold medal in their 22nd gold medal match appearance out of 38 FIVB Swatch World Tour events together. Alison/Emanuel, who also lost to the Americans on Thursday in Round 4 of the winner’s bracket in three sets, claimed their fourth silver medal and seventh overall medal in 13 tournaments as a team..
Top-seeded Dalhausser/Rogers are the reigning Olympic champions and FIVB SWATCH World champions who won nine gold medals on last year’s FIVB Swatch World Tour and played in their 30th final four. Alison/Emanuel, a new team the past two seasons made it to their fourth gold medal match and ninth final on the FIVB Swatch World Tour.
Dalhausser/Rogers extended their FIVB men’s record match winning streak to 29 playing in their 16th consecutive FIVB Swatch World Tour final four.  The Americans also increased their lead in the head-to-head matchup against Alison/Emanuel to 8-1.
The US$380,000 Brasília Open featured both men’s and women’s competition in Brazil’s capital. Nearly 140 teams from 35 countries.competed the season-opening event of the 2011 FIVB Swatch World Tour that started here for the third straight season. The winning teams in each gender shared $30,000 first-place prizes, second place $21,000. In Friday’s women’s gold medal match, Brazil’s Juliana Felisberta Silva beat USA’s Misty May-Treanor/Kerri Walsh.
Celebrating its 25th anniversary in 2011, the international beach volleyball circuit the Competition was held on The Esplanada dos Ministérios in Quadrante 1 in Brazil’s capital city. Sunday’s finale was the 49th FIVB Swatch World Tour men’s gold medal match featuring Brazilian and American teams. With the victory USA now leads 25-24 in this gold medal rivalry.
With the standing room only crowd at the Brasília Open center court cheering feverishly to start the match, Rogers scored first for the USA and then the teams battled back and forth through 13 ties with the last one at 17-17 before Dalhausser scored two consecutive points on blocks of Alison and after a Brazil time out, Dalhausser scored on a cross court kill that went by Emanuel. Alison gave his team a point at 18 on a kill through Dalhausser’s block attempt and then Rogers finished the set on a slap shot to the right corner.
In the second set, Alison started with a kill off Rogers for a point but then the Americans ran off five straight points on two Dalhausser blocks and three errors by the Brazilians, building up leads of 11-5, 13-6 and after Alison/Emanuel closed the gap to 13-18, Dalhausser had a kill followed by a Rogers kill off Emanuel and ended the match on two more blocks by Dalhausser. Dalhausser had 11 blocks for points in the match, including eight in the second set.
“Rogers commented following his team’s match, “We love playing in Brazil, the fans are the best in the world and the Brazilian teams are the toughest to beat match in and match out. We played them two days ago in a match that turned out to be much closer, but they are a great team and they made more errors than we did and that turned out to be the difference.”
In last year’s gold medal match in the Brasília Open, Alison/Emanuel lost to Dalhausser/Roger, 21-16 and 21-12 in 38 minutes and on Thursday they were beaten by the Americans in a three-set, 53-minute match, 21-16, 19-21 and 11-15.
On Saturday, the veteran Emanuel, 38, who appeared in his record 100th career FIVB gold medal match, and has won a record 69 FIVB gold medals, was attempting to win a gold medal with his fifth different partner in Alison.  He is also the FIVB career earnings leader with over $2,000,000.
Emanuel commented afterwards, “We had a great week here in Brasília. We played at our best level, which makes us very happy, especially because of the one year of preparation for an Olympic spot. I want to thank Rogers and Dalhausser for coming here and playing against us because it raises our level. Today they were able to neutralize our game, especially our offense.”
In Sunday’s bronze medal match held on another jam packed Brasília center court stadium prior to the championship final, China’s 10th-seeded Penggen Wu/Linyin Xu defeated third-seeded Marcio Araujo/Ricardo Santos of Brazil 21-17, 16-21 and 51-10 in 52 minutes. It was a rematch of their winner’s bracket quarterfinal match on Thursday that Wu/Xu won in three sets by near-identical scores to the bronze medal match.  The bronze medalists earned $15,000 while Marcio Araujo/Ricardo collected $11,200 for their fourth place placement.
Wu/Xu now lead the series between the two teams 3-1. For Wu/Xu, the win earned them their 12th FIVB Swatch World Tour medal, including their fourth bronze medal in their 14th final four appearance.
Brazil has staged a FIVB Swatch World Tour event every year since the start of the international series for men in 1987 and women in 1992. This was the 33rd men’s event and 28th women’s tournament on the FIVB Swatch World Tour held in Brazil. This was also the 13th time Brazil was the site of a season-opening event on the international circuit.
After the Brasília Open, the 2011 FIVB Swatch World Tour continues with a single-gender event (women) in Sanya, China next week starting Tuesday. Following Sanya will be a double-gender event in Shanghai, China (May 2-8).  Myslowice, Poland (women) and Prague, Czech Republic (men) will then host single-gender events on May 17-22.  After a two-week break, Beijing, China hosts the first grand slam event on the 2011 FIVB Swatch World Tour on June 6-11 followed the 2011 FIVB Swatch World Championships in Rome (June 13-19).

Sunday, April 17, 2011

Brasilia, Brasil 2011

And so a new journey begins. Today I leave for Brasilia, Brasil for the first event of the season. It is an Olympic Qualifying event on the FIVB Tour so not that they weren't important before, but now they not only pay the bills but decide whether or not you get to go to London. The offseason has been good. Got to spend most of it at home coaching my daughters soccer team and hanging out with the family. Look forward to seeing how Phil and I will do this season. Will be tough to do much better than last season but we will put our best foot forward and see what happens.