Australian Team Profile
Australia's hopes of a volleyball medal at the Beijing Games rest with our stars of the sand.
Given our love affair with the sand and surf, it's not surprising our strongest chances of success come in the beach volleyball competitions.
The beach events in China will be held at Chaoyang Park, south-east of the Olympic Green.
Natalie Cook and Tamsin Barnett will fight it out on the women's side while Josh Slack and Andrew Schacht are also medal prospects.
Cook and Kerri Pottharst won Australia's first-ever volleyball Olympic medal when they won the bronze at the Atlanta Games in 1996.
Four years later in Sydney, the second time beach volleyball was contested at the Games, Pottharst and Cook won gold in front of a parochial crowd on the famous Bondi Beach.
Cook, 33, is competing at her fourth Olympics.
Slack and Schacht are an experienced outfit who play together regularly on the professional circuit.
Australia's first indoor Olympic volleyball teams played at the Sydney Games as the host nation.
Only one Australian indoor volleyball team - the men in Athens 2004 - has qualified to play at the Olympic Games.
Australia did not qualify for the men's or women's indoor volleyball in Beijing.
Australian Olympic Beach Volleyball Team
Men's: Josh Slack and Andrew Schacht
Women's: Natalie Cook and Tamsin Barnett
Previous Australian Medallists:
Gold:
Natalie Cook, Kerri Pottharst (2000) - Women's Beach
Bronze:
Natalie Cook, Kerri Pottharst (1996) - Women's Beach