(Added: Thanks to Sam Nizam for the photo of Zaun & Palm celebrating their victory)
Though beach volleyball is a fixture on Alki just about every summer weekend, it’s not always as big as the tournament that just wrapped up about half an hour ago: The pro players of the National Volleyball League have been here since Thursday night, for the NVL’s first-ever Seattle stop, seventh of eight on this year’s tour. In the women’s finals, Brooke Niles, head beach-volleyball coach at Florida State U, and Karolina Sowala from Poland won in three games:

(Photo by Paul Walchenbach)
The women’s championship match was followed by the men’s final, taken, also in three games, by Dave Palm from Florida and Eric Zaun from New Jersey. We photographed Palm earlier (center, with hand signal) during their semi-final match:

Palm and Zaun are now the only duo with two wins this season, after winning the Hermosa Beach tour stop earlier this month. The NVL’s 2015 tour concludes September 25th-27th at the league’s training facility in Port St. Lucie, Florida.