Brazil's women will be chasing a third straight Olympic gold at Rio 2016
Lausanne, May 1, 2015 – Volleyball remains the most popular of the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Olympic Games sports after the first round of ticket sales ended on April 30.
Brazilian residents had from April 1 until April 30 to enter the Olympic ticket ballot and volleyball led the way from the opening date until the last, while beach volleyball was the seventh most popular sport by ticket applications.
Brazil have high hopes for gold medal success in both men’s and women’s volleyball and beach volleyball.
The women’s team won the Beijing 2008 and London 2012 gold medals, while the men won silver in Beijing and London, but claimed gold at Athens 2004. If the women retain their Olympic title they will match Cuba’s achievement of three consecutive Olympic golds from Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1996 and Sydney 2000.
In beach volleyball Juliana Felisberta and Maria Antonelli are the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour champions and Juliana won London 2012 bronze, alongside Larissa Franca. In the men’s tournament there has been a Brazilian team on every Olympic podium since Sydney 2000, with the evergreen Emanuel Rego and Ricardo Santos victorious at Athens 2004. Emanuel also won silver at London 2012, alongside Alison Cerutti.
The men's and women's volleyball events at the Rio Olympics are scheduled to take place at the Maracanazinho Arena, while the beach volleyball tournament will be located at its spiritual home, the world-famous Copacabana beach in a 12,000-capacity arena.
In total, about 7.5 million tickets for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games will be put on sale. Click
here to view and download the Rio 2016 Olympic Games Ticketing Guide, which has the full details of the ticket sales process.