By Daryll Nanayakara

HOW does one train for beach volleyball, if one comes from a landlocked country with no beaches?

To solve that problem, Olga Kozlova and Sabrina Azizova of Kyrgyzstan went up to one of their country's many mountainous regions, some 2,000m above sea level.

There, in an artificial court built beside Kyrgyzstan's only water body, Lake Issyk Kul, they trained for the Asian Youth Games for the most part of last month.

In fact, that was their first time playing beach volleyball, even though they had played indoor volleyball together for seven years.

And guess what? They are performing superbly at the AYG competition in Sentosa, finishing at the top of Group G after beating Singapore's Tan Yi Ting and Dorita Peng yesterday.

In fact, the duo were more awestruck by the fact that they are playing at sea level for the first time in their lives.

Sabrina explained: "We were playing just next to the sea, so that was a little bit of a surprise for us."

 Back home, according to the duo, "people can live in areas up to 4,000m above sea level, and training at 1,500m is considered normal".

Now, Sabrina and Olga have their target set on a podium finish - quite an achievement for a landlocked country like theirs.

When asked who they thought were their biggest threats, they singled out the duo of Bakhtygul Samalikova and
Lyubov Bogatu from Kazakhstan, another landlocked nation.

The four volleyballers are actually very good friends off the court, but as Sabrina said cheekily: "We are going to be best friends for life with them.

"But when it comes to sports, such things won't matter."

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