Mark Burik (00:02.234)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Better at Beach podcast and YouTube channel. Just so you know, if you're watching on YouTube or listening on YouTube, you can always support our podcast, support our company, keep us going. We have super likes and memberships where you guys get exclusive content and you can earn some badges on YouTube. So if you want to check out those badges, you can check it out underneath the video. There is a link where you can become a member and help us keep making volleyball content.
and we will send you some goodies along the way and you can earn some badges as well as some private chats. Our members are currently going through our serving course. So if you have ever wanted to learn a jump float serve or a jump spike serve and figure out how to increase the efficiency of your serving game along with serving strategies and techniques, drills to upgrade that, we're going through it right
So today's Tuesday, April 8th, and we have three more weeks of our serving block with our online members. And after that, we are going through our passing and serve receive course later on, followed by setting, jump mechanics, arm swing mechanics, and attacking in the summer. But if you want to look to upgrade your passing and your serving, you should check out the online membership right now. It's betteratbeach.com forward slash.
virtual training. There's also a link underneath this video that you can check out. And we have upcoming camp dates this weekend. You still have a chance to sign up April 11th to 13th in Scottsdale, Arizona. May 2nd to 3rd will be in Austin, Texas with a tournament on May 4th. So you could sign up for the camp and or the tournament. And then we'll be in Long Island and in San Diego by Coastal May 30th.
We will be in Tacoma, Washington June 6th, but that is sold out again. And each June 20th, Milwaukee, June 27th, Bend, Oregon, July 25th, Santa Rosa, California, August 1st. And this week, I want you guys to make sure that you are on our email list and paying attention.
Logan Webber (02:00.732)
Yeah.
Mark Burik (02:16.806)
Because yet again, we will have 64 spots, 32 men, 32 women going to our all-inclusive trip in the Dominican Republic in Punta Cana. So if you want to come and play all-inclusive beach volleyball, play, train, party with us, that will happen the weekend after Thanksgiving. But we are releasing the links and if it's anything like last year, we will sell out pretty quick. So make sure you're on our email list, links underneath the YouTube video or the podcast.
want to do it. And please subscribe to us if you're listening and you haven't subscribed. I want to hit a hundred thousand followers on YouTube this year and we need your help.
Brandon Joyner (02:56.812)
and Instagram.
Mark Burik (02:58.35)
and Instagram. Be nice to hit that 100k mark.
Brandon Joyner (03:01.112)
I know, I feel like we should have been there by now. I don't know what, you guys, get on it. We can't follow ourselves more than once.
Mark Burik (03:10.758)
And throw Logan a follow too, he's still hovering around three grand.
Brandon Joyner (03:15.522)
Yeah.
Logan Webber (03:16.13)
Hey, that's rude. I'm almost at six. Yeah, yeah.
Brandon Joyner (03:18.104)
Hahaha.
Mark Burik (03:20.292)
Yeah. Nice. Yeah. Growing. today guys, we're going to talk everything Norseca. and you know, then we can just putz around for a bit, but Logan, you just played a Norseca qualifier. and if you guys are, have seen the title N O R C E C A. So first Logan Weber, please explain what
Brandon Joyner (03:20.878)
Same, same.
Mark Burik (03:50.114)
Norseca is, or if you're Canadian, Norseca. And then what the qualifiers do and what it means for a player.
Logan Webber (03:54.8)
Norseka.
Logan Webber (04:02.377)
Yeah, well basically I like to explain it as Norseka is kind of like the AA baseball of the World Tour. So it's kind of like a minor league starting spot, I guess, for a lot of athletes that are trying to get to the point of playing like the Challenge and Elite 16 level of World Tour events. But it allows for
basically like an entry into the points game of the World Tour without having to go and play futures events in Europe or Asia or something like that and basically be futures events unless they're, sometimes even if they are in your home country, you're basically guaranteed to lose money with futures events. And currently, just give the financial example of a futures event.
The winning team of a Futures currently splits $1,000 US dollars. And just flying to Europe, obviously your flight is going to be about $1,000 anyways. And most Futures don't provide any sort of hotel or accommodations or anything like that anymore. And also from an American volleyball player perspective, USA Volleyball doesn't give any support for Futures events.
So it's basically all on the athletes to put up all of the money if you want to go and play a futures event. We'll start with just the average Norseca tournament because there's a couple exceptions to the examples that I'm going to give. But basically every calendar year there's typically between I would say like eight and 10 of these just like typical Norseca tournaments.
The Norseka tournaments give 80 % of the points of a futures event. So they're not as many points as the futures, but they're still a good starting spot for somebody who doesn't have any world tour points. The catch with the Norseka tournaments is basically they have a list of countries. I'm not really sure how they formulate this list, but it typically goes
Logan Webber (06:27.065)
US, Canada, Cuba, Mexico, and then a bunch of the other kind of Caribbean island countries. Norseca literally means like North and Central America. So it's kind of like a regional or like zonal continental type thing. If you're familiar with soccer at all, I believe it's like Conca Calf or something like that is the soccer equivalent to Norseca.
So at these eight to 10 tournaments every year, there's one spot available for every nation in North and Central America. And then if a country doesn't go, that empty spot kind of falls to that first team on the list, which traditionally has been the US. So typically the US ends up getting two teams into a North Seca tournament.
And then if there's another open spot, which there typically is, because if like St. Kitts or like the Cayman Islands or somebody like that doesn't send a team, it falls usually to Canada and then to Cuba. So most tournaments you'll see on the men's side, you'll see two American teams, two Canadian teams. And then typically it'll, you you'll have a team from the Dominican Republic. You'll have a team from Mexico. You'll have
like Guatemala or stuff like that, all the Central American countries. So that's kind of how that breaks down. And then like I said, it's 80 % of the points of the futures. Now from the US perspective, we obviously have a lot of good teams that are trying to get world tour points. So I think it's maybe been five or six years in the current system where
the US will hold a single elimination qualifier with usually between eight and 12 teams on like a Tuesday in Manhattan Beach. And it's pretty funny because like they're really good, like kind of high stakes tournaments, especially when we start talking about the world champs and Olympic qualifiers, but we'll talk about that in a second. But they're obviously like really good tournaments. They're all fully professionally reffed. But yeah, they're on like 10 AM on a Tuesday.
Logan Webber (08:45.129)
So you get like a bunch of really good teams playing on the beach in Manhattan Beach and nobody really knows about it And then how those qualifiers go is it's single elimination Whoever wins the the tournament itself becomes the number one US team and whoever finishes second becomes the number two US team and Just within the last two years. That's kind of become a big difference so it didn't didn't used to really matter usually the finals were just kind of a toss-up because
there's always two American teams that get to go. But within like the last two years, USA volleyball stopped funding the entry fee and the hotels for the number two team. And the entry fee for a Norseca is like $500. So it makes a big difference now, whether you win the tournament or get second. And those qualifier tournaments qualify you for basically the next three, usually it's three or four Norseca events. So for every Norseca event,
There's one, every three or four Norseca events, there's one qualifier in Manhattan Beach. Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (09:51.598)
Logan, how do they decide who can sign up for those qualifiers? Can anyone sign up?
Logan Webber (10:01.241)
Anybody can sign up, but they do typically cap them. Like this past Friday was capped at eight teams. And those, the seating for that and subsequently the just who gets in and who gets booted out of the tournament used to be based on World Tour points. And it's now based on domestic ABP or ABP America points.
Brandon Joyner (10:25.762)
And is that sign up? I'm wondering, because I know I'm from, I mean, we're all from outside of California, which is pretty funny, but when I was living in Virginia, I had no idea that this was even a thing. And so if we have people that are listening from Florida, from the East Coast, from the Midwest, where would they sign up and look at that list?
Logan Webber (10:51.081)
There's a page on the USAV Beach website. I'm trying to think of how I normally I just Google search like USAV event registration and it'll be the top link on the Google search. And that page has all of the Norsega qualifiers and it's also where you would sign up for any futures, challengers or Elite 16s is all on that.
on that page and now it's all run through volleyball life as well. But typically, typically if you just, I mean, the way that I do it is I literally go on Google and search that every time and then it just takes me to that link.
Mark Burik (11:24.069)
Hello.
Brandon Joyner (11:34.136)
So they have the qualifier sign up for the Norseka on Volley Life now.
Logan Webber (11:40.275)
Correct. Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (11:41.998)
That's awesome. Hopefully more people are seeing that. That's really cool.
Mark Burik (11:43.376)
Good job.
Good job, Johnny Mohawk and Ed Routledge.
Brandon Joyner (11:49.472)
Yeah.
Logan Webber (11:49.853)
Yeah, Johnny was actually down there on Friday morning. I said hi to him. I'm not sure if he was meeting with USA volleyball or what they were doing, but him and Kevin McCulloch were down there. And I was like, man, I haven't seen you guys in a while. So I'm not sure at what point, Mark, maybe you can attest to this, but I don't know if there always used to be a qualifier for that or if it used to just be kind of like an arbitrary decision on what teams got to go. I'm not sure on that one.
Brandon Joyner (12:01.058)
Yeah, that's cool.
Mark Burik (12:17.114)
to the comp.
Mark Burik (12:22.022)
You mean to the actual qualifier?
Logan Webber (12:24.457)
To the, like, for some reason I always had in my head at one point USA volleyball just selected teams to go to the North Seca tournaments, but I could be wrong. There's always been qualifiers for them? Yeah, okay. And that goes back a long time at this point.
Mark Burik (12:33.38)
At least not my day. it's been a long time. but no, I always played, qualifiers there. There were some instances where USA volleyball chose a couple of guys or supported them in some way. Like I remember they sent.
Brandon Joyner (12:39.309)
Hahaha
Mark Burik (12:56.196)
Will Montgomery and try born to, New Zealand to play in their three, three event pro tour. And, you know, me and Jeremy case, we were there at the same time. We're like, what you guys are getting paid for this. We were like, so upset. but yeah, it's, it's good training and it, you know, I, there's, there's gotta be a better way. I think for.
Brandon Joyner (13:11.031)
You
Mark Burik (13:22.742)
USA to find or source or pay like Let's get some scholarships and some funding for grassroots You know and and yank these kids away from indoor like there's good right now in Texas his name's Seven one he can pass he can set Brennan. We played him in the camp Like
Brandon Joyner (13:47.553)
yeah, yeah. It's big. Yeah.
Logan Webber (13:48.841)
I played them last week.
Mark Burik (13:51.812)
Purifying, but he's got no incentive. He's, I think he's in engineering or something. but he's got no incentive to come to California and play. And this kid's seven one athletic can pass and set and like spiking for guys is just, yeah, everybody can spike. and so like there, why don't we have this and say, Hey,
kid who we think has great potential, we want to send you specifically to this. So I think if there is that second spot for a Norsega, even though I do like a merit based system, I think USA should hold onto a spot and say, we're going to scour the country. We're going to trust our word of mouth coaches and players everywhere and say, we're going to pick somebody under 25.
to send as the second U S team. And I think that would be finally a way to like encourage a little bit of growth in, the program and, start to nurture some young talents. but as it is right now, you know, you have the USA training and we had the U 26 training and then the elite program training, but
There's no incentive. have to move. have to commit fully to California before USA says, you know, the USA indoor team, they would call these college coaches and say, we're inviting you to our training camp. Right. Hudson, Hudson Bates, he got the call. Like our coach got the call from the U S national team and said, come train with us to the indoor, indoor national team. You'll spend two, three, four weeks with us.
I don't remember if it was on USA volleyball's dime or if Hudson had to pay for that. And I don't know what it is now, but I think beach could really use that and then, you know, give them some incentive to train. So.
Logan Webber (15:48.477)
Yeah, I agree.
Brandon Joyner (15:48.834)
Yeah, because I know they do for the juniors and stuff like that. They have these camp little tryouts that they do. It's just interesting that it stops at a certain age. And then it also feels like it's not truly complete. They have all these tryouts where you can make a specific team. know talking about Hudson again.
Mark Burik (16:00.4)
Mm-hmm.
Brandon Joyner (16:17.282)
Hudson is now part of the coaching program where like they come, some of those kids get selected to come out and train. But then it's like, once they make that little roster and like the, I think the Basies and Thomas, right? Yeah. I think they, like, know Keeter and Carson Barnes and those boys, like they kind of came up through that pipeline, but then it's like,
Mark Burik (16:35.046)
Thomas.
Brandon Joyner (16:47.466)
Once they're outside of that age group and now they're kind of in the running to compete against the Logan Webbers and the Chase Bollinger and the Andy Beneshes of the world. It's like, what happens then? It's almost like we're putting the effort into getting those juniors and selecting them into something higher, but then it almost falls off at the more important age group where.
We're trying to choose people that are going to make a run for us at the Olympic level. And I know we have that coaching program, the USA program here in California, which I'm not sure how they select what teams are in that. But.
Mark Burik (17:29.552)
Yeah. Logan, they get accommodations for that? If you're selected for the training camp, are accommodations covered or flights covered for the younger people?
Logan Webber (17:41.673)
When I was looking to come out and do something like that, back when they had like the high performance teams still, I paid all of my way to do the tryout. And once I made the team, it was just the coaching bit. Everything else was on the athletes still. I know the exception to that is any sort of like age group tournaments or like Youth Olympics or
Like the, was the stuff that Gage and Thomas have been doing. Any of that age group stuff, the trip itself is funded from USA Volleyball, but the training blocks themselves are not. And I think there's a bunch of different things within USA Volleyball that they've been discussing recently that would make some pretty big changes. And maybe that's a good topic for another podcast, because I can go on for a long time about that.
But I just think the tough part being out here is there's not like one of the things they're contemplating trying to make a more like centralized program for everything. And it's just like the way that beach volleyball community works, especially out here, everything is so decentralized that it's, it's just hard to like, you look at like the Dutch beach volleyball system that they have and
Mark Burik (18:42.95)
Give us a like, give us a like, give us a
Logan Webber (19:10.949)
Everybody trains in one building in one on like one campus within like their Olympic Committee, you know center and there you have, you know, dormitory style stuff that people, know, they can provide housing to people and they can come and do training camps and everybody is under one roof and under the same coaching staff. And then you compare that with how we operate. And it's like, nobody's using the same coaching staff.
Everybody's it's just very fragmented and I'm not sure. I know Sean's been working a lot on trying to like centralize more of it. I'm just not sure that the the community itself out here. Is really even that open to being a more centralized like team because we just don't see ourselves as a as a single like USA volleyball team. It's. You know, chasing miles and it's miles and Andy and it's myself and Hagen and it's.
we're all competing against each other so much that I think just shifting that culture to be more of like a, we're a team and then that team is broken off into pairs. And I think short of USA volleyball telling us who we have to play with, I don't think anything is gonna really change that at any point, at least not in the near term.
Mark Burik (20:33.638)
interest.
Brandon Joyner (20:33.656)
Could you see USA stop stepping in at some point and suggesting partnerships?
Logan Webber (20:40.177)
I would be a fan of it to be honest with you. think I've always been under the impression that like if somebody is going to give you funding, especially like monthly funding, like USA volleyball does, you're an employee of theirs. And if your employer tells you to work with somebody different, then you work with somebody different. If I want to play with somebody else that they don't tell me to play with, I can still do that, but I'm not going to be subject to getting their funding anymore.
And I think there's obviously discussions to be had within that, but I think if I'm an employee of somebody, that's I'm their employee, I don't get to tell them who I work with if they're funding me.
Brandon Joyner (21:25.098)
interesting way to, yeah, it makes sense.
Logan Webber (21:29.033)
I mean, you wouldn't see Matt Anderson, the indoor right side, be like, hey, we're not starting Micah Christensen this game. I want Micah Ma'a instead. You can give that suggestion, but ultimately, Karch isn't going to be like, well, Matt doesn't want to play with Micah Christensen, so we're going to bench him and put Micah Ma'a. And if you're a part of that team and you're employed by that team, then you don't really get to make those decisions.
Brandon Joyner (21:49.134)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (21:57.222)
Especially, think that's, that works like heavier, especially if you gather is the USA coach coaching staff. Like this is coach for team A, this is a coach for team B, because then you could look at that coach. And if there's a relationship issue, Hey coach, this is your job to fix their little relationship. You know, if they don't want to play with each other, it's your job to get them motivated so that they can, they can fire up with each other. It's an interesting model. think. Yeah.
I think most USA players would like kind of hate losing the freedom of getting Jews who they want to play with, but some of them might love it. Cause some of them would be like, no, I belong with the big blocker. They're just like not picking me up. Just give me one shot and you never get that, that shot. But if you design a cauldron system within.
An entire USA volleyball like beach volleyball and then you run it like our our Kings and Queens leagues on Monday nights Where hey you play with everybody and the top two performers? We're gonna see how you guys play together this week, you know but maybe a little more practice cauldron activity where you can
play with different people and see what happens on these mix ups. Cause there's so many surprising teams that you're like terrible on paper or awesome on paper. And then it just turns to crash, but you're committed for the season. Right. So why not experiment with the different relationships, different touches? some people's style just somehow works out together. You know, I don't think anyone thought came in James Shaw would do this good. This, this quick early in the tournament.
I think everybody recognized it. Of course, came to Olympian and James Shaw has a high line that looks like a bounce. So like there was some danger built in, also try and came. Everybody thought they should be doing better. You know, on paper, you got the top defender in Canada who came to USA. You got the top two, three blocker in the U S like should have been a better team on paper, but.
Logan Webber (24:07.517)
Yeah.
Mark Burik (24:07.782)
It would be interesting to see how the develops somehow.
Logan Webber (24:12.499)
just to round out our Norseka discussion as well. There are a couple of kind of outlier tournaments every year that happen under the kind of Norseka umbrella. So every year that has a world championship tournament, so world champs happen every two, I should know this, every two years, I believe, there's a world champs tournament.
And so like this year it is in November in Australia. And every continent gets a certain amount of bids to send teams to that world championship. So North Seca every year has every year that there is one of those. They have a tournament that is just for world champs qualifying.
And the, I believe it's the top, roughly the top four teams, finishers in that tournament get the Norseka bids to go to world champs. So to give the example, the...
Every country can only send one team to that Norseka World Champs qualifier. So typically that, the US qualifier for that qualifier is usually super stacked because it's like everybody in the country wants to try and get into World Champs through that. So that's the tournament that you'll see. The really crazy one like in Manhattan Beach on a Tuesday when you'll have like
Miles and Andy playing chase and miles in one semi final and like, you know, Theo and Trevor playing, you know, came and James and the other semi final and there'll be like 15 people on the beach watching it. And it's like this, this realistically means more than the Manhattan beach final, but there's just people don't really know about it they don't really see it that way. the other one, which happened, last year was the,
Logan Webber (26:23.623)
That same thing happens only instead of for world champs, it happens for the Olympic spot for Norsega. So similarly to world champs, every continent gets one team that they send to the Olympics. Now, obviously if two teams have already qualified from any one country, that negates that. So typically what happens and it happened, I think it happened this year is, yeah, it did.
Usually what ends up happening is one of the Canadian men's teams ends up getting the North Seca bid to the Olympics. So like Sam Schachter and Dan Deering last year, because Cuba had already qualified for the Olympics, Diaz and Elio, and obviously the US already had a team that qualified for the Olympics. So Canada went to the North Seca Olympic qualifier, beat
Mexico in the finals and that got them a spot in the Olympics. So if there hadn't already been an American team that had qualified for the Olympics, we could have qualified through that North Seca route as well. So those are kind of the two like world champs and Olympic qualifier tournaments that are a little bit outlying from the regular ones. And then every year there's also a like continental tour finals, which I believe is what did you win that like?
handful of years ago, Mark? Yep.
Mark Burik (27:52.58)
and full.
Brandon Joyner (27:53.71)
Skyball Burek.
Mark Burik (27:56.068)
No, it was at night. Couldn't skywalk. I can't see the sky.
Brandon Joyner (27:59.662)
Well no, that's how you won the Pan Am thing.
Logan Webber (28:03.965)
Yeah.
Mark Burik (28:04.03)
yeah, we're losing by 12, so was like, let's go.
Brandon Joyner (28:07.916)
Hahaha
Logan Webber (28:10.023)
But that the world or the Continental Tour Championship doesn't actually qualify you for anything, but it has the equivalent points of a challenger world tour tournament. So the points themselves are massive in that one. So when you have the the US qualifier for that one, it's also usually like super stacked. So for instance, this past year, Miles and Chase ended up getting the bid to
to the North Seca Continental Finals. And that was like right in the middle when them and Theo and Trevor were super close in the Olympic race. And because Chase and Miles ended up going to the North Seca and getting, think maybe a second, I think they might've lost to Diaz and Elio maybe. But that second was the equivalent to a second in a challenger without having to really.
beat teams that are at that challenger level. So that Norseca win, which came from them again, winning a match on a Tuesday afternoon in Manhattan with nobody watching, really was like a big leap for them to qualify for Paris, which is not.
Brandon Joyner (29:23.982)
Yeah, I remember seeing videos of that qualifier and it was like Chase and Miles were celebrating more after that qualifier win than they were like any AVP win that I saw. Like they were pushing each other, they were so hyped. Yeah, so it's kind of funny. We gotta start making announcements of when those tournaments are. So we can get some people out to the beach.
Mark Burik (29:44.282)
Yes!
Logan Webber (29:46.035)
get Beach volleyball media to come live stream something.
Brandon Joyner (29:49.624)
Yeah.
Mark Burik (29:49.708)
USA, better be, she'll start live streaming. I tried to hire Mason and he turned us down. I think these tournaments should be on weekends, should be promoted, should be put in a place where we can get some fans. I know that they don't want to like.
Logan Webber (29:53.438)
Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (29:54.267)
Yeah, you guys. Yeah, I think, go ahead.
Mark Burik (30:16.056)
ruined tournaments. I know that it's tough to work with Manhattan and Hermosa and you want to make it easy for the players to get to, but we've got LMU, you know, we've got these colleges that are, that are right nearby that we can, you know, they should be happy to rent to USA volleyball for a tournament and put a stage on for these pretty important events. The fact that nobody knew that that had crazy Olympic,
We saw indications was the word I was looking for. Thank you from an accountant, less wordsmith. It's, it's crazy. And it's always like this weird feeling of, yeah, this is an ABP level tournament. and sometimes a world tour level tournament and there's 17 people watching and it just feels the same as it feels at 10 AM on every Monday, Wednesday, Tuesday, Friday in,
Logan Webber (30:44.073)
applications.
Logan Webber (30:49.737)
Mm-hmm.
Brandon Joyner (30:49.9)
Hahaha!
Brandon Joyner (30:55.15)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (31:12.814)
in Manhattan and Hermosa. it's just weird. And it should be pushed more heavily. And maybe it's up to us. Maybe it's up to beach volleyball media, the McKibbins. Like get cameras there and get people watching. Make a big spectacle of it, at least online. Yeah.
Logan Webber (31:30.909)
Yeah, I think there's a lot of good storylines with some of the like young up and coming players that play a lot of these Northsega qualifiers as well, whether that's, you know, like a Gage and Thomas who like most people probably haven't really seen play too often, but like they are the, you know, in the next two Olympic cycles, like they're, they're kind of the guys right now. And it's, you know, you get those guys, you just get a lot of like kind of a younger,
up and coming teams that are obviously have ambition of playing World Tour, they won't be there in the first place. And it's, it would just be such a good, you know, place for them to get some recognition and get people to, you know, be interested in, in some of the younger talent as they come up, as opposed to just the people that are making, you know, AVP Sundays.
Mark Burik (32:23.334)
Let's talk for a second about number one, the vibe at Norse Aigus. And number two, the fact that so many teams who win and earn a spot don't end up going.
Brandon Joyner (32:28.046)
Yeah.
Logan Webber (32:39.023)
Mm, yeah. I'll start with that, because then we can get into the action. We'll finish up the discussion about the US qualifiers and then actually get into the North Seca tournaments themselves, because there is endless entertainment in talking about the North Seca tournaments themselves. Yeah, so it's interesting, because I think over the last, when did I first start playing those, maybe the last three years, I think I've won.
Brandon Joyner (32:39.246)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (32:52.219)
Hahaha
Logan Webber (33:06.697)
six of the Norseka qualifiers in the last three years. And I've only ever been to two Norseka tournaments. So for me, it's A, it's just really good, like match intense practice to like be able to go there on a Tuesday and have like a fully rest, you know, tournament with exact start times and like you are playing for something, right? So it's
It's good practice for like an AVP qualifier type event, because that's kind of what it feels like.
Mark Burik (33:37.668)
And I will say it's pretty good practice. I'll say it's good practice for the FIVBs too, because in the early rounds of a lot of FIVBs when you're on the outer courts, again, there's no energy from the crowd. There's no like pumped up. AVPs always feel like there's a crowd from energy crowd. But when you go over to the world tour and you're on the outer court and there's six people on the Friday or Saturday, like you have to learn how to
Logan Webber (33:55.699)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (34:06.096)
create your own energy. So I do think it can be good practice for that as well.
Brandon Joyner (34:10.016)
Yeah. And you're getting used to the pace. I know the first North Second qualifier I played in, was like, they were actually sticking to that eight second serve count. And you're like, Whoa, I did not realize that I was Bill Kalinske-ing every single AVP I played in. And I was taking 14 seconds before every serve. Yeah. They rush you through that. that, that alone, you got to get used to.
Logan Webber (34:32.519)
Yeah. so yeah, a, they're good practice. and for me, it's always just been, even if I don't expect to, to go to the tournaments that it qualifies me for, at least it gives me like the option in case something weird happens with my points and I like need to go and try and get points. the other thing is, and we'll get into this in a second, but some of the places, some of the North Stakers are more desirable to go to than other North Staker tournaments. So.
Brandon Joyner (35:01.443)
Hahaha
Logan Webber (35:02.405)
Even if, for instance, this past tournament, qualified you for, I think, maybe two in the Dominican Republic, one in El Salvador, and then one in La Paz, Mexico. And I've actually been to the La Paz, Norseca, and it is unbelievably nice, one of the top three Norseca destinations, I would say. So what happens is, if the winning team doesn't end up
like taking the bid, it just trickles down to the next finishing team. So occasionally, like there's been times where a team will show up in like an 18 qualifier, they'll lose their first match, but they'll still end up going to the Norseca because the bids trickle down, which is obviously good. You know, it's good for the development and for USA volleyball because it's not like they disappear, right? So nobody's necessarily going and like stealing a bid and then not using it.
And like the other one, Hagen and I, think the first time we ever played together was in our second qualifier, like four years ago. And we really wanted to go to this one in, in Canada and we qualified and then the North Saka in Canada got canceled. So we didn't end up going to any of them because Canada was the only one we wanted to go to. so there's, there's some weird situations that happen with them. but again, they're just, they're really good practice. and just having the options available to like, if I choose, I can go to this.
has always been a big reason that I play it. And again, they trickle down. So most of the time people play out the third place match because that match can be a big deal sometimes if somebody doesn't, if the top team or the top two teams don't take their bid, then that trickles down to then third, fourth, and then all the quarterfinal losers.
Mark Burik (36:53.542)
Yeah. There's even those conversations that you have, like you have in, you know, Jersey and New York of, do you want, do you want to play the final or do you just want to split it? Sometimes you have that conversation by asking the one and two team. Hey, are you guys going to, are you going to the tournament or no? And then that'll determine if you actually choose to play, which to me, it's always like, dude, let's play more valuable. You know, to not play for that third and fourth is like.
Brandon Joyner (36:54.828)
Yeah.
Logan Webber (37:08.647)
Which ones are you going to? Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (37:17.485)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (37:20.986)
Crazy to me, but what happens where the third and fourth place teams, if they don't want to play that extra match for whatever reason, they'll ask the one in two teams, say, are you definitely going to all of them? you might not. Okay, then we'll play the third and fourth place match.
Brandon Joyner (37:22.094)
Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (37:36.246)
Yeah. And I think it's like for everyone listening, especially our East coasters or people in Cali.
sign up for the Norsecas. If you are even considering doing anything or if you just want the opportunity to like go to cool places and represent the US. Like when Logan's talking about the trickle down, I think I've attended three Norseca tournaments and one of the qualifiers I got third and then my other two that I went to, I got last place in the Norseca qualifier.
And the trickle down went all the way to us and we still got to go. like Logan was saying, like one of ours was in the middle of Mexico, which was a really fun event. was kind of like extreme culture. And then the other one was at an all inclusive resort in the Dominican Republic, which was awesome in itself as well. So yeah, it's like.
Logan Webber (38:35.689)
Not as awesome as the better of each camp in the Dominican Republic is going to be, but pretty close.
Brandon Joyner (38:38.408)
Not nearly as awesome, but it was close. But yeah, even if you're like, obviously you want to be competitive. Like even when I was playing in those events, were tight with teams, but you're playing against the best teams in the US. So, but yeah, it's definitely worth playing because that trickle down is pretty cool once you get that call.
Mark Burik (39:02.02)
Okay. We've got eight minutes. Everybody gets to share their funniest or Sega tournament story. Because if you guys don't, you know, you've never been to the tournament. So you think it's an international event. It's tournament organizers. have national teams. It's obviously this hyped up good event. And typically, very typically it is a mess.
Logan Webber (39:06.345)
Hehehe.
Mark Burik (39:27.294)
mess from hotels to taxi rides to chickens and dogs running across the court, playing on rocks. So each of your funniest or best Norsega story, and they've got to be under two minutes apiece.
Logan Webber (39:47.709)
Yeah.
Brandon Joyner (39:47.746)
So my, I'll share a good one. We'll quick, Aguas Cayentes, that was when I played with Alex Diaz. We were like in the heart of Aguas Cayentes, set up courts, crowd was awesome. Like it was in Mexico. It was one of the best environments that I've ever played in. Unfortunately, we had to deal with like food poisoning and stuff like that because the water wasn't good to drink and that messes with you. My favorite story though is when we were in the Dominican Republic.
the guys that represent the island countries are awesome. Like they are the coolest people and it has that small time feel where like your local tournaments that we have in the US where after the tournament happens, everyone parties. And I remember one specific night where like the tournament had finished and there was some like island song that all the island guys knew the song and they're like,
there's a DJ on the beach and everybody was like picking up furniture and like holding it dancing above their head and like running around. And it was like the most fun I've ever had at any tournament that I've ever played in. And it's like, you have five days to meet these people. And then you just feel like the community itself is super welcoming. So I didn't have to deal with like a messy tournament per se on the ones that I went to. It was just like really,
people to where when I see them today or like they comment on my face my Instagram I'm like man I miss you like I cannot wait to see you again it's so cool
Mark Burik (41:22.694)
You
And they're also some of these matches like the national team is not at the level that you think it might be. I've, I've won a couple of, a couple of matches like 21, one, 21 to, to the point where you're should I keep serving this ball in, you know, like starting to feel, feel bad.
Brandon Joyner (41:39.726)
Hmm.
Brandon Joyner (41:48.876)
Yeah, but also at the same time, you look on the other side of the net, even if you are beating a team like that, and they are as happy as they can be to be on the court playing against you. Like they look up to the USA players so much and like, they're just happy to know you and be around you. I think a lot of players that haven't gotten the chance to do that can learn how to be a good sport from a lot of those players. It's really cool.
All right, Logan, story time.
Logan Webber (42:21.865)
I've only ever been to two actually. so I've qualified for probably 20, but I've only ever gone to two. just in general, Mexico puts on the best beach volleyball tournaments in general of any federation in the world. so even the, the, all of the Mexico, Norseca events are just like pretty top notch, all of their challengers and elites, everything, everything tournament wise when you go to Mexico is amazing.
but the, the, the La Paz event that I went to, I'll go with an after party story as well. we were, I was sitting there, with savvy, CMO and we were watching Evan and Bill in the finals against Mexico's number one team and the stadium was packed. were just heckling nicely, but like getting after, especially Evan, cause Evan likes to
haunt the crowd quite a bit. and so like that final itself, it was at night, it was big stadium. It was just awesome to be like a part of that. And there was so much energy. And then, yeah, afterwards, like all of the players were just hanging out, like in the players tent at the, at the tournament. And there was a bunch of music going and there was like this, this tent with a pretty high peak, like one of the big white tents they have at all the AVP tournaments and stuff.
there was a really bright light that they had at the top and everybody was like, man, it's way too bright here. And so some kid from, might've been like like a St. Kitts in Nevis, one of the island Caribbean countries, he like scales the pole of this tent and it's probably like 20 feet in the air, scales it like this, like hands and feet climbs to the top of like the peak of this tent and unscrews the light bulb.
and just takes it down with him and comes back down because the light was way too bright. And as we were doing this, there's this guy, Andy, think Andy Garcia is maybe his last name, but he's yeah, he's like an absolute Norseco legend. He's a blocker from Guatemala. he's, mean, guys probably played in a hundred Norseco events. And he just started like freestyle rapping as this kid was like,
Mark Burik (44:30.49)
some good parties and like good awkward moments.
Logan Webber (44:47.753)
scaling the tent, taking down the light. it was the whole thing in general was just like so epic. Yeah, that one that one was was pretty amazing. But there are a lot of like hilarious stories of, you know, having to get Hagen as a good one of like getting it having to get his own taxi through Cuba and the taxi driver had to like stop and like get gas. it was there's some crazy, crazy stories. But you just got to go into it like
kind of expecting the worst and then all of the memories are amazing while you're in it, it's kind of tough, but like the memories themselves, if you just like, you know, are grateful and don't expect like five star accommodations everywhere, it's pretty great.
Mark Burik (45:35.236)
All right. We, we had one where we got to the airport. Transportation was supposed to be covered by the tournament. There's 20 players sitting, wondering where we go. They gave us no information on the hotel or where we're staying. So there was like a two hour pause there. And then they eventually bus a bunch of us to this mom and pop looking hotel. And we're like, no.
We're all kind of a we're in there. get to the hotel and the hotel goes, huh? We, well, we don't have space for you. And so then it was like a trickle down effect. Some players ended up staying there and some were then bust to others. But then one of the players stole something from somebody else's bag and there was like a big fight. And then he eventually gave it back. Uh, and.
Then another one, Kirk got there sometime after me. They gave me a room at an all-inclusive resort, but the all-inclusive resort, again, didn't know that we were staying there, didn't have any of our booking information. So, Kirk's like, he gets there a few hours later and we're texting and he's like, hey, I'm here. I go, okay, meet me by the pool. He's like, I'm literally at the pool. Where are you? And we found out that we were staying at completely different hotels. So, we ended up having,
two rooms for two of us at separate hotels and we kept transferring and partying there.
Brandon Joyner (47:08.558)
Call that luxury.
Mark Burik (47:10.982)
Dancing in my underwear with Andy Garcia. Cayman Islands tournament with Miss Cayman Islands. And I wasn't dancing with her, she was just there, she was present.
Logan Webber (47:14.729)
Yep.
Logan Webber (47:24.851)
Good disclaimer.
Brandon Joyner (47:25.794)
Sure now.
Mark Burik (47:25.83)
Yeah. And then at that same Cayman Islands tournament, it was so humid and so hot that the trip to the water station was like, I don't know, maybe it was a hundred yards away. And the trip to the water was again, like another, I don't know, 60, 70 yards. And I'm so hot and so dehydrated that I'm drinking so much water and I have to pee every two seconds. And I like kind of did some internal math and I go.
I'll probably lose more water walking to the ocean or to the water station. So I just basically let it go on center court a couple of times while just being drenched. go, what is the difference now between this water-based pee and the sweat that's coming out? go, probably nothing.
Logan Webber (47:57.075)
walking to the water.
Logan Webber (48:16.699)
This is back to back days I've had a conversation like this, which is weird.
Brandon Joyner (48:20.398)
Well, you're dealing with my Iron Man stories. But man, Mark, the Norsecas in the 90s must have been rough.
Mark Burik (48:26.65)
We haven't discussed that in a while.
Logan Webber (48:33.597)
Hahaha.
Brandon Joyner (48:35.406)
You
Mark Burik (48:37.158)
I'm not that old. still got a Yeah, I know I'm planning to come back at 44 If I can do it, I just gotta you know, I get a qualify at 50. I got I want to sit right so I just keep swinging my capitals and it will be fun Yeah, but yeah, those those norsegas are an absolute mess. Do you know Andy Garcia story by the way?
Brandon Joyner (48:45.624)
There you go.
Brandon Joyner (48:55.214)
There you go.
Logan Webber (49:02.573)
I heard he had a pretty rough childhood and then somebody basically like hand picked him and was like you should play volleyball and like basically picked him up off of the street pretty much.
Brandon Joyner (49:08.898)
Yeah, he like...
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Mark Burik (49:12.25)
Yeah. He was walking on the beach, looking for food and dead fish to try to, to try to eat. And there was a Brazilian coach who had been hired by the Guatemalan Federation. He was so malnourished that he had no teeth. but he had like long arms and he still had an athletic looking body. And this Brazilian coach was just like, Hey, come on over. Let's just like, get you playing some volleyball. And it completely.
Brandon Joyner (49:26.926)
Mm-hmm.
Mark Burik (49:38.052)
turned his life around that coach took care of him, like housed him. And then the Guatemalan federation started finding different like jobs and opportunities, but yeah, took him from near death or certain future death and like turned him into Guatemala's top volleyball player where, you he ended up going to the Pan Am games a couple of times and his life.
Logan Webber (49:58.729)
We played him in the last one in the Pan Am games.
Brandon Joyner (50:00.014)
It's amazing.
Mark Burik (50:02.778)
Yeah, and he's fun to play, because he'll never back down. It doesn't matter, he'll come right at you, even if you block him a few times, he's not the type of guy that shuts down or gets disappointed. He just puffs his chest bigger and goes harder. I loved competing against him. So, Norsecas, guys, if you want to take an all-inclusive trip or you want to go to the islands, schedule it around a Norseca tournament, and number one, you'll be able to
Brandon Joyner (50:03.681)
He's awesome.
Mm-hmm.
Brandon Joyner (50:22.424)
Fun, fun time.
Mark Burik (50:30.694)
probably play volleyball with a few guys. number two, you'll meet a bunch of pros and then you'll see some epic player parties because those, those player parties don't hold back. And there are next to zero player parties on the world tour, but Norsega, Norsega trumps all of them. think, except for the Chicago end of the year, ABP, those have been pretty historic because it's the last ABP tournament of the year.
Brandon Joyner (50:38.776)
Mm-hmm.
Brandon Joyner (50:46.07)
the AVP.
Mark Burik (50:57.7)
Everybody always finds a good spot in Chicago to gather up. And I think the Chicago post-players parties are the best. But Hermosa Manhattan, every now and then you'll have a good one. It just depends, I think. But Chicago has always been on it since, again, last tournament of the year, so historically.
Brandon Joyner (51:01.294)
Yeah.
Logan Webber (51:19.249)
Labor Day weekend usually as well. Nobody's got to work on Monday.
Mark Burik (51:25.658)
Cool. I think that's a good, good rundown. I don't want to thank, Nathan from beach volleyball media. Who's got a crazy good YouTube channel right now. He's got over 300,000 subscribers. I just checked the other day. he's doing good content for beach volleyball and he posted that on Instagram. And I was like, you're so involved in beach volleyball. Is that a serious question? Like, did you, and he was there filming it and he was like, yeah, I have no idea.
Brandon Joyner (51:26.562)
Fun chat.
Mark Burik (51:52.528)
what this tournament means or does. And so I answered him and then I go, thanks, that's our next podcast topic. All right, I think that's it. Yeah guys, we got camps coming up. If you wanna fix your server receive and passing, just head to betterbeach.com forward slash virtual training. We will help you out. I still have a few spots for one-on-one players. If you check out that page, you'll see all of the details where
Logan Webber (51:58.889)
Hmm
Mark Burik (52:22.778)
You get 12 private video lessons. You get the year of the complete beach volleyball training blueprint and you get to come to all of our camps for a full year. No extra charge after that. So if you want some one-on-one private training from me, hopefully soon Logan, if we can convince him to get in there and Brandon and DJ, then we would love to be a part of your journey and.
teach you everything that we have learned along the way on a one-on-one customized basis. So check it out. All the links are below. And if you haven't subscribed, please do. And if you enjoyed this or you think it was important for people to know or hear some stupid stories, go ahead and share the episode.
I
Brandon Joyner (53:10.838)
Alright, good chatting. Fun memories brought up, that was cool. Yeah, every time I've been at a Norseka, Jake McNeil, who I've crowned the Norseka King, he always makes it a point, no matter what time of year, he always tells everybody that it's my birthday. And it is hysterical. I miss that guy.
Mark Burik (53:13.517)
Thanks for having me. Yes, hosting. Yeah, good time, good memories. I think a lot.
Logan Webber (53:15.433)
Hmm.
Logan Webber (53:22.643)
Yep.
Mark Burik (53:38.214)
All right, cool. We'll wrap it up. Thanks for listening, everybody. We'll see you on the sand.
Logan Webber (53:43.625)
Get better.
