Young athletes endure 24-hours of volleyball
The maiden timeout Volleyball Academy 24-hour challenge took place last weekend. The purpose of the event was to raise money through donations from the athletes to help build a new LED floodlight system at the DTS beach volleyball Arena at DTS sports ground
Over 30 athletes participated in the challenge, with the youngest, Leo Kesselmann (7 years) and the oldest in their fifties, and 18 of these survived the whole 24 hours. The games started at 10am and were played throughout Saturday up until the next morning.
James Verrinder, the event organiser, said he was extremely happy with the number of participants attempting to play for 24hours. According to Verrinder three-quarters of the participants were under 18 years old which showed great commitment and strength of character to help raise money.
Athletes played different variations of volleyball which included King of the court, mixed 2-a-side and the service game, which helped the 24 hours to pass quickly. The hardest parts of the 24 hours was between 1-4 pm when it was particularly hot and sunny and between 2-5am, when athletes were tired, sore and mentally exhausted.
The event also hosted a special kids beach volleyball session. 19 children participated between the ages of 6-14 years old with Coach James leading them through a beach style warm-up, coordination and ball skills and some team work exercises. Then they had chances to put their practice into action with the famous service game.
The purpose of the event was to raise money through donations from the athletes to help build a new LED floodlight system at the DTS beach volleyball Arena at DTS sports ground. The beach volleyball section has already raised 80% of the money needed through Volleyball-for-all tournaments over the past couple of years.
Verrinder said, participants worked very hard to collect donations from friends and family. “I had a target of N$20,000 I would have liked and I’m very pleased to announce that we exceeded that target with the generosity and support from everyone,” he said.
Sponsorship for the event included: Proactive, Binary City, Liebherr, Pennypinchers, Fabupharm, OTB Sports, DTS EXCO and Timeout Beach Volleyball Academy.
