Laying it all out on the sand, USA's diving Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor won their pool with a 3-0 mark and now are ready to attempt to capture their third consecutive gold medal as the round of 16 starts Friday at the London 2012 Olympic Games

London, Great Britain, August 2, 2012 – As Big Ben’s hands turn, so the clock has moved forward for 16 group of the original 24 the world’s best women’s teams Thursday as the single-elimination phase starts Friday on the road to the gold medal at the London 2012 Olympic Games beach volleyball competition at Horse Guards Parade in central London.

A total 24 women’s beach volleyball teams from 19 countries started playing in London last Saturday in the purpose-built, sold-out 15,000-seat stadium on the grounds of the iconic Horse Guards Parade as the majestic venue also includes a portion of adjacent St. James Park in historic central London.

Four sessions will be held Friday with two matches in each (one per gender) for the first half of the round of 16 matches with the balance to be played on Saturday. The sessions are scheduled to start Friday and Saturday at 9 a.m., 1 p.m., 5 p.m. and 9 p.m.

With the eight matches split over two days, here is the breakdown of the daily match schedules for the women’s round of 16:

Friday, August 3—
9 a.m. - Germany’s Sara Goller/Laura Ludwig vs. Germany’s Katrin Holtwick/Ilka Semmler
2 p.m. - Brazil’s Juliana Felisberta Silva/Larissa Franca vs. Netherland’s Madelein Meppelink/Sophie van Gestel
5 p.m. - Switzerland’s Simone Kuhn/Nadine Zumkehr vs. USA’s Jennifer Kessy/April Ross
10 p.m. - Austria’s Doris Schwaiger/Stefanie Schwaiger vs. Russia’s Anastasia Vasina/Anna Vozakova

Saturday, August 4—
9 a.m. - Russia’s Ekaterina Khomyakova/Evgenia Ukolova vs. China’s Chen Xue/Xi Zhang
1 p.m. - Spain’s Elsa Baquerizo/Liliana Fernandez Steiner vs. Italy’s Greta Cicolari/Marta Menegatti
6 p.m. - Brazil’s Maria Antonelli/Talita Antunes vs. Czech Republic’s Kristyna Kolocova/Marketa Slukova
9 p.m. - USA’s Misty May-Treanor/Kerri Walsh vs. Netherlands’ Sanne Keizer/Marleen Van Iersel

In the series history between each of the teams meeting in the round of 16 on Friday, in the all-German match, Goller/Ludwig have a 13-2 lead in the series with Holtwick/Semmler, Brazil’s Juliana/Larissa lead the series with Holland’s Meppelink/van Gestel 3-0, the series between Switzerland’s Kuhn/Zumkehr and USA’s Kessy/Ross is tied at 3-3 and in the late evening match Friday, Austria’s Schwaiger sisters have won the only meeting with Russia’s Vasina/Vozakova.

On Saturday, the series history between the teams meeting in the second half of the women’s round of 16, it will be the first meeting between Russia’s Khomyakova/Ukolova and China’s Xue/Zhang, Italy’s Cicolari/Menegatti are ahead in the series with Spain’s Baquerizo/Fernandez 3-2, Brazil’s Antonelli/Antunes are undefeated with a 5-0 record against the Czech Republic’s Kolocova/Slukova and USA’s May-Treanor/Walsh are 2-1 in the three matches they have played against Holland’s Keizer/van Iersel.

Current event info and results is available at www.fivb.org.

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