Volleyball is a true team sport. It was invented in 1895 in Holyoke, Massachusetts, by a physical
training director. He was looking for an alternative to basketball for middle-aged men. By 1918, the
game had become a worldwide sensation.
Volleyball was added to the Olympic programme in 1964 in Tokyo where both men and women competed, and it has brought some of the most exciting moments to recent Olympic Games. In 1996, Volleyball-Beach will be added to the programme for the Centennial Olympic Games.
A total of 24 teams will compete in Volleyball at
the University of Georgia in Athens and the Omni Coliseum in
Atlanta, while the Volleyball-Beach competition will feature 40 teams (2 athletes per team - 24 men, 16 women)
volleying for gold on the lakeside beach at Atlanta Beach located in the Clayton County International Park, just south of Atlanta.
| More tickets were sold to the competitions of the 1996 Games than to any other Olympic Games or sports event in history. The 8.6 million ticket sales figures topped sales to the Los Angeles and Barcelona Games combined. |