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The sport may have only arrived in Bermuda this year, but that hasn't stopped the island sending a team to the Beach Tennis World Championships.

Andy Bray - one of the island's top tennis players - may have practised all his life on clay and hard courts.

But, along with tourism entrepreneur Tony Brannon, he's about to reach the pinnacle of the game on sand.

Bray only took up the game a few months ago when Brannon, who has organized an international tournament to be held in Bermuda in September, started organizing pick-up games at Horseshoe Bay to drum up interest.

Now he is travelling to Ravenna, Italy to compete alongside Brannon against the best in the world.

Bray admits the pair are unlikely to come back with any silverware. The European form of the game, which involves beach bats and balls rather than regular rackets, is even less familiar to them than the U.S. style beach tennis, using ordinary rackets and a depressurized ball, played in Bermuda.

But the aim of the trip is as much to raise publicity for the September tournament as anything else.

"It's the World Championships, but that's a bit of a misnomer because basically anyone can enter.

"Ravenna is the world headquarters for beach tennis. It's huge out there - there are hundreds of courts.

"Tony's going to promote the tournament in September and see if we can get the official world champions to play here."

The pair will compete in the countries division and possibly the open draw between August 1 and 3.

Bray said the local players had really embraced beach tennis.

"Everyone compares it to beach volleyball but it's actually more like badminton. Apart from the serve, which is the same - it's about dropping it short and moving people around the court, like a game of chess. Having a big forehand doesn't really help you a great deal.

"It's a laugh but most of the top guys on the island go down there and when it gets close we do start to take it seriously."

For more information on the Bermuda tournament between September 19 and 21 or on how to get involved go to www.bermudabeachtennis.com.[[In-content Ad]]

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