Vital stats
Age: May is 27, Walsh is 25
Height/weight:
May is 5-9, 150;
Walsh is 6-2, 155
Lives in: May is from Los Angeles; Walsh is from Manhattan Beach, Calif.
Today’s event
The U.S. women’s match is live on NBC between 11:30 to 3 p.m.
Day job
May and Walsh play pro volleyball.
Olympic experience
May finished fifth at the 2000 Olympics with former teammate Holly McPeak. This is Walsh’s first Olympics.
Background
To honor her late mother and grandmother, May, who played at Long Beach State, has a tattoo of her mother’s initials on her shoulder and her grandmother’s initials on her back. Walsh was only the second player in NCAA history to be first-team All-American all four seasons at Stanford.
Early days
May learned how to play volleyball from her father, Robert May, who was on the U.S. volleyball team that placed seventh at the 1968 Olympics. When Walsh was a sophomore in high school, she once asked for the autograph of her idol–yes, one Misty May.
Did you know?
The pair appeared in that Super Bowl Visa commercial in which they played on a snowy beach and shot fingers to decide who gets the ball from the icy water.
Post-Olympic star potential
Two female beach volleyball players playing a sport popular with an
advertiser’s dream demo?
Star power: 8 out of 10.
In the booth Women’s beach volleyball broadcast team
Chris Marlowe: Captain of ’84 U.S. gold medal team does AVP play-by-play on NBC.
Kirch Kiraly: The three-time Olympic gold medalist competes on the pro beach circuit.
2000 medalists
Women’s beach volleyball
Gold: Natalie Cook and Kerri Pottharst, Australia
Silver: Adriana Behar and Shelda Bede, Brazil
Bronze: Adriana Samuel and Sandra Pires, Brazil
