Lucerne, Switzerland, May 12, 2015 - Sixteen-years-old Eduarda Santos Lisboa is poised to compete with women’s top athletes after winning the Beach Volleyball gold at the Youth Olympics in Nanjing.
She’s without a doubt the biggest rising star in international Beach Volleyball scene. The 16-year-old has already got more gold medals in her palmares than the majority of more experienced players in the FIVB World Tour.
But Eduarda’s success doesn’t surprise anyone in Brazil since she was born with the passion for Beach Volleyball. “My mother used to play in the Brazilian national Beach Volleyball tour and took me to every tournament,” Eduarda, who is competing at the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour Lucerne Open 2015 this week, says. “So I literally grew up on a Beach Volleyball court.”
So Eduarda followed in her mother footsteps and started to play volleyball when she was five years old. She has already made history at the age of 14 as the youngest Brazilian player ever to scoop gold at the 2013 FIVB under-19 Beach Volleyball World Championship in Portugal.
Furthermore, the player from Minas Gerais stunned the entire Beach Volleyball world with her success initially at the 2013 FIVB under-23 World Championship in Poland followed by two titles in 2014 by defending her FIVB under-19 title in Portugal before claiming a gold medal at the Nanjing 2014 Youth Olympic Games in China.
And the young Brazilian already enjoys the advantages of a Beach Volleyball life. “It’s really interesting to visit other countries, since there are big differences between the cultures and get to know new friends,” said Eduarda.
Nevertheless, the Brazilian youngster has to admit that she feels homesick sometimes: “It’s quite difficult,” she says. “Meanwhile friends of mine go to school and stay with their friends, I travel around the world and do an online school; but I love Beach Volleyball and my family and friends understand my big desire to become a professional player.”
Despite the busy agenda, Eduarda doesn’t want to neglect her studies and already knows what she wants to do after school. “I want to study trophology at an online university,” she says. “That’s the only way to play Beach Volleyball and study at the same time.”
This week, however, Eduarda wants to focus on Beach Volleyball at the inaugural Lucerne Open. The aspiring star is sure that the Lucerne Open is an important opportunity to get more experience. “I’m only 16 so having the possibility to face some of the best players in the world is really important in order to make progresses,” she says. “Firstly, however, we have to make the Main Draw.”
Eduarda and partner Elize Maia did make the Lucerne Open Main Draw after eliminating teams from Japan and the United States in Tuesday’s qualifiers. The young Brazilian and her 30-year-old partner now await Tuesday night’s technical meeting where they will learn their schedule for the next two days in hopes of reaching Friday’s elimination rounds.