If you watch virtually any beach volleyball tournament, and you take note of the teams that are in the quarterfinals, the semifinals, the finals, the rounds you want to be in, you'll notice one major commonality shared by all of them: They set the ball well, almost every time. 

Now, of course, there are a number of variables determining or influencing what goes into a good set. The pass is the first touch, making it either exponentially easier or more difficult to set the ball to the intended target. Then there's wind and rain and all of the elements that make beach volleyball so dang fun. However, those elements -- the pass, the wind, the sun, the rain -- are all out of our control. What's in our control is what we do with the ball when it's in our hands. 

Our job as the setter is to better the ball, no matter where it is. Good pass? Let's make the set better. Bad pass? Let's give our partner some help and roll it up with some of that fine hand-set nectar honey-butter...

Whether someone is just learning how to play volleyball or has been playing for years, the most common question we get is "How high should I pass?'  In the sand volleyball world, this question can be answered many different ways, but the information below should give you all the answers you're looking for!  

If you're interested in this blog on beach volleyball serve receive and passing, you may want to take a look at our passing and serve receive course! We'd love to have you drop by one -- or more -- of our beach volleyball classes, private lessons and training camps for adults and juniors in Hermosa Beach, CA and Salt Lake City, Utah. We run volleyball vacations in exotic locations around the world. We can even run beach volleyball clinics for your group, club or team in your hometown! Send an email to [email protected]

At every level in beach volleyball -- from BB to co-ed to the ball at your local bar to the finals...

Peeling off the net may be one of the most underappreciated skills in beach volleyball. Yes, we all love the monster block. We all love the swat block. They look fantastic, are huge momentum plays, and are the fastest ways to score points in a beach volleyball tournament. Staying at...

Today we've got a little transition setting and offensive decision-making drill to help your beach volleyball game.

We're going to show you what we did here on my side of the court. I'm coaching here, we have four zones - two zones in the sharp sidelines, and two zones in the deep corners. This is how I measure it out on the beach volleyball court.

Go to the deep corner of the court and take two giant steps along the sideline towards the net. Now, take one step into the court dragging your foot to make a line in the sand. Face the net again and drag your foot until you get to the volleyball net. You should have a big rectangle on the sideline that starts at the net and goes to about two thirds depth into the court. You should do the same thing on the other sideline. You'll be left with two rectangle zones along the sidelines that are about 20 feet long and 3 feet wide. These are your "sharp sideline" zones.

The deep corner zones should then be about 6 feet by 3 feet or 2...

It's not only the setter's responsibility to put the hitter in a good position. Great attackers put themselves in a position after the pass where it's easy to set them a perfect ball -- and if you'd like the most effective, fastest way to become the best setter on the beach, give our setting course a try!

When you have great footwork, and you religiously create a great distance relationship between yourself, your hitter, and the volleyball net, it becomes more likely that you will score points.

I want you to take special notice, that none of what I...

One of the most formidable aspects of AVP pro, and Better at Beach CEO Mark Burik, beach volleyball skill sets is his serve. He has so many different types of serves it's a little difficult to count: jump serve, standing float, jump float, jump serve with side spin, jump serve with no spin. It's difficult for any player, at any level, to be comfortable passing, especially since he...

Beach volleyball pro Mark Burik talks about Defense in this 1-on-1 video analysis...

Hey everybody and welcome to another Better at Beach video analysis. This is a match showing beach volleyball pros Mark Burik and Tri Bourne playing against Brazil but did you know you can get your game analyzed by real pro's right here?! If you've ever wondered how  an AVP or World Tour player would fix your game, looking no further than our one on one online beach volleyball coaching. We guarantee you will have a deeper understanding of beach volleyball strategy.

Open a tab by clicking one of the links above, then come back and let's show you how much you can learn through online beach volleyball coaching.

We have about a minute of clips here and we just want to go through the details of each point with you and see if we can pick up some new skills, new tips, and discover how the pros are doing it.

In this video we take a look at what goes into scoring points in beach volleyball at the World Tour level. This is one of my qualifier matches in 2016 in Rio....

You guys asked, and we're going to deliver: You wanted to hear more about defense in beach volleyball, so that's what we're going to cover today. 

The video below is our match -- Mark Burik and Ian Satterfield -- vs. Sean Rosenthal and Chase Budinger at AVP San Francisco. One of the reasons...

It's a mental game, beach volleyball defense. Doesn't matter if you're playing in Hermosa Beach or Austin, Manhattan Beach or New York City, San Jose or the South Bay. It is, as a popular saying goes, "chess, not checkers."

Which is why we wanted to show you this video. Austrian Olympian...