Beach Volleyball's Moment

The competition at Beijing's 12,000-seat Chaoyang Park Beach Volleyball Ground is one of the hottest Olympic tickets.

The sport, with its beach-party atmosphere featuring impeccably cut and tanned athletes competing in skimpy bathing suits, is seen as having huge entertainment potential, which is why NBC is featuring it live in prime time throughout the Summer Games. At the volleyball arena in China, where the sport is relatively new, crowds clap along to music from Shania Twain and Michael Jackson as Chinese cheerleaders whip up the enthusiasm.

Watching the Olympic competition with keen interest are a number of promoters who hope the attention will help them turn beach volleyball into a perennial moneymaker, rather than a novelty hit that comes along every four years. The top U.S. teams of Phil Dalhausser with Todd Rogers and Misty May-Treanor with Kerri Walsh are gold-medal favorites in the men's and women's tournaments, which conclude next Wednesday and Thursday.

Despite the millions tuning into the myriad attractions of beach volleyball during the Games, the Association of Volleyball Professionals Inc., which operates games around the U.S. under the banner of the AVP Crocs Tour, is struggling to become profitable. A rarity in the U.S. as a sports league whose shares are publicly traded, AVP Inc. recorded a $4 million loss in 2007, its sixth consecutive unprofitable year.

But optimism remains. "Coming off the Olympics, this is going to be very big year for us," Leonard Armato, a former sports agent who helped found AVP in 1983 and became chief executive in 2001. "We're going to get a big boost."

Courtesy THE WALL STREET JOURNAL