T&T women's beach volleyball pair, Ayana Dyette and Nancy Joseph enjoyed a mixed day of results when the eight leg of the Norceca Beach Volleyball Circuit served off at the Central American Stadium in Boqueron, Puerto Rico on Friday.
Playing in a four-team Pool A round-robin series, Dyette and Joseph won their opening match against Hondurans, Christianne Etches and Marissa Brady 21-14, 21-11, but was then upended by USA's Sarah Hughes and Kelly Claes, 9-21, 6-21 ahead of their final group match against Mexico-B duo, Stephanie Burnside and Gloria Santoyo.
In the two other matches contested in the pool on Friday, Hughes and Claes outlasted Santoyo and Burnside 21-19, 19-21, 15-12 for a 2-0 record while the latter got its first win, 21-9, 21-5 over Brady and Etches.
In Pool B, the FIVB Best Defensive team in Nanjing 2014 Youth Olympics Puerto Rican Valeria Cajigas and Lina Bernier ended the first day with a 2-0 record after beating Costa Rica-B pairing, Katherine Quesada and Eugenia Ramirez 18-21, 21-14, 15-12, and Guatemalans, Bianca Ocana and Anna Ramirez 22-20, 21-16
USA-B's Irene Hester and Caitlin Ledoux overwhelmed Ocana and Ramirez 21-5, 21-6 while Canada-A's Victoria Altomare and Julie Gordon also won, 21-16, 21-15 against Quesada and Ramirez.
And in Pool C, Mexico-A, Martha Revuelta and Bibiana Candelas started well, 15-21, 21-18, 19-17 over Canadians, Kacie Mac Tavish and Caleigh Whitaker, and then Dominican Republic pair, Magen Boltin and Pamela Jaime 21-8, 21-6.
Mc Tavish and Whitaker rebounded to beat Costa Rica-A, Karen Cope and Natalia Alfaro, 21-18, 21-13 while the latter swept US Virgin Islanders' Jamie Farley and Amber Bennett 21-8, 21-7. Bolton and Jaime had one win, 21-17, 21-17 against Farley and Bennett, 21-17, 21-17.
The final round of group matches and quarterfinals were carded for yesterday ahead of today's semifinal and final.
This is the first tournament for the local women since the fifth leg in Mexico after which they missed the sixth and seventh legs in North Bay, Canada (July 9-14) and Varadero, Cuba (August 20-25).
So far this season, Dyette and Joseph were 12th in the fifth leg held in Mexico in June, after starting off with an 11th-placed finish in the Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands in April followed by 12th in Guatemala City and a best so far this season of seventh, in Antigua Guatemala during the third leg in May.
The next leg takes place in Chula, Vista, California, USA (October 1-6) followed by stops in Vera Cruz, Mexico (October 15-20), Costa Rica (October 22-27) and the final leg for a third straight year, in T&T, Pigeon Point from November 12–17.