31/07/2015 11:02
Longuet/Jupiter pick up last-minute call to claim superb result for France
2015 CEV Beach Volleyball European Championship - Final
Klagenfurt, Austria, July 31, 2015. Last Saturday, at around noon, Laura Longuet and Alexandra Jupiter received an e-mail announcing that following a couple of withdrawals they got the opportunity to join the 2015 CEV Beach Volleyball European Championship Final in Klagenfurt. They immediately phoned their travel agency to organise their trip to the world’s Beach Volleyball ‘Mecca’, packed their bags and on Sunday night they arrived in Klagenfurt, ready to play their first European Championship as a team.
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Last year Longuet had competed at the European Championship Final in Cagliari finishing in seventeenth place there alongside Vanessa Bonacossi. This time, after sweeping three matches in their pool and losing on Friday morning to Russia’s top team Evgenia Ukolova and Ekaterina Birlova in the second elimination round, Longuet and Jupiter claimed an almost historic ninth place for France in Europe’s elite competition. “We should be checking the list of honours but it definitely has been a very long time since a French team made it this far at a European Championship Final,” a visibly happy Longuet said.
They have been training together only since January and have rapidly established themselves as their country’s top team. “Last week we were preparing for the final stage of our national championship which is taking place right now in France but after we were offered the chance to come to Klagenfurt, we did not hesitate for a second,” Longuet recounts. “This was our major goal and we have been working hard this season in order to be here. We made the semis at the CEV Satellite in Vaduz in early July and got points from a few WEVZA zonal events in Barcelona, Montpellier and Senigallia. These tournaments are very useful for up-and-coming teams to develop and especially because they offer points that we really need to move up in the current rankings. We definitely encourage the development of such events and are willing to travel to such tournaments anytime we get the chance to go,” she adds.
Since a couple of years the French Volleyball Federation have started a Beach Volleyball programme focussing on the development of teams that are likely to make the Olympics. “After this competition here in Klagenfurt, we will travel to Biel/Bienne for the next Masters and then go home to continue our preparations for the next round of the Continental Cup which is coming up in early September in Sochi, Russia,” Longuet says. “This is almost our only chance to keep on chasing the Olympic dream and we are determined to perform well there. We are France’s first team and most probably we will be joined by Ophélie Lusson and Aline Chamereau, who are currently preparing for the U22 European Championships coming up in late August in Portugal.”
Jupiter has completed the transition from Volleyball to Beach Volleyball and is very pleased with her decision. “I always wanted to play Beach Volleyball professionally and so the switch was an easy one for me once I decided I would stop to play indoors completely,” she says. “We are grateful to the French Volleyball Federation because with their support we are now professional, full-time Beach Volleyball players, and without their help this wouldn’t be possible.”
As for their first experience in Klagenfurt, Longuet seems to be mesmerised by the world’s Beach Volleyball ‘Mecca’: “This morning we came here quite early and we got to see a terrific stream of people making their way to the stadium, and that was really impressive,” she says. “Now that our tournament has come to an end we just want to enjoy the ambiance, hang around for a while and get to feel the atmosphere of this place as much as we can, hoping to perform here again in the future.”
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