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Bondi beach volleyball venue rises above pre-Olympic controversy
= = SYDNEY, Sept 25 (AFP) - In the lead-up to the Sydney Olympics there was no venue more controversial than the 10,000-seat beach volleyball stadium at Bondi Beach - it caused protests and political rows and was as a result built late and under heavy security. But as the beach volleyball competition comes to a close Tuesday with the men's finals, the stadium on Australia's best-known beach has risen above the controversy to become the thunk-thunk-thunking party heart of the Sydney Olympics. "Lets hear it for beach volleyball on Bondi Beach!" the announcer yelled out near the end of Monday's women's final, setting off a roar of approval from the crowd that must have startled the surfers paddling outside. With a DJ spinning tunes ranging from bass-heavy dance music to Santana and James Brown and a wandering MC trotting around the court to fire up the crowds, beach volleyball has become a beach party at the Sydney Olympics. A new variant on the curse of stadiums everywhere, the wave, has been unveiled - the slow-motion wave. Done as a Viennese waltz blares out from the PA system, it can send even the most cynical sports fan into stitches. The atmosphere has been so electric that players have called the stadium the best they've ever played in and talked about it lifting their game. The effect was especially true for Australian women's pair Kerri Pottharst and Natalie Cook who emerged with a gold medal Monday and said playing in front of a home crowd in the stadium was like riding a wave that made every game they played in it better than the last. "It's the most fantastic venue of all time," Pottharst said. "But to do this in front of my home crowd in Sydney in front of family and friends is just awesome." The protests against the temporary stadium - it will be dismantled after the Olympics - had centered on environmental concerns and the simple fact that erecting scaffolding on Sydney's playground would create an eyesore for local residents and international visitors alike. The stadium is not pretty from the outside. A tangle of scaffolding, it takes up a full third of the beach and is surrounded by barbed-wire topped fencing that gives it the slight air of a prison camp. But on the inside it's a different story. "I think it is beautiful," said Brazilian bronze medallist Adriana Samuel. "To me it is the best place I have played in the world." Better even than Rio de Janeiro's Copacabana Beach where she competes when she is home in Brazil? "Today yes," Samuel grinned.
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