World Tour 2012 Winners: Gibb-Rosenthal

Few have predicted that after the two podiums in the 2011 season (silver in Shanghai and bronze in Quebec) Gibb-Rosenthal could show the shape of their lives in Swatch-FIVB World Tour 2012. Enjoying their most fruitful beach volleyball summer, Jacob Gibb, 36-year-old, and Sean Rosenthal, 32, topped the World ranking after the last event in Stare Jablonki.

Gibb-Rosenthal finished a position below the podium at the Mazury Orlen Stare Jablonki Grand Slam partly because of the forfeited bronze medal game due to Jake Gibb's back injury. The 5th position of their main rivals - the 2011 World Tour winners and 2012 Olympic silver medalists Emanuel-Alison, however, guaranteed the Americans more ranking points and thus their 4th-place finish was enough for the crown at the end of the 2012 beach volleyball calendar. They lost again the Shanghai Open final at the beginning of the season, but appeared lethal in the Rome and Gstaad Grand Slams. The victories there marked their lead in the World Tour and pinned them among the chief title contenders. The next two Grand Slam medals - silver in Berlin and bronze in Klagenfurt, contributed to the perfect season of the yankees despite the relatively disappointing quarterfinal defeat in the London Olympics. As a matter of fact, they finished at the same 5th place four years earlier in Beijing.

"The high point is winning the Swatch-FIVB World Tour championship. If you had asked me before the season if we were going to win... it's never even been a goal", Gibb stated. "It was a stunner and a wonderful surprise. The low point would be, I felt like we were contenders going into the Olympics and we didn't get the finish we wanted. In my volleyball career winning this world tour championships is my biggest accomplishment and certainly our biggest as a beach volleyball team."

Two other teams apart from Gibb-Rosenthal lifted World Tour events trophies twice in 2012 - Emanuel-Alison (Berlin and Moscow) and Dalhausser-Rogers (Brasilia and Shanghai). The three tandems raced for the title till the very end and concluded a really interesting championship. The Grand Slam consistency of Gibb-Rosenthal, however, was decisive when the final ranking points were calculated in late August.

Brink-Reckermann from Germany appeared only four times in the 2012 circuit, they had to wait for the recovery of Jonas Reckermann and as a result sacrificed their World Tour performance in the name of a better Olympic preparation. The decision they took paid off as they lifted the Olympic gold medals while finishing at the modest 25th World Tour ranking position.

Swatch-FIVB World Tour ranking 2012 (top 10):

1 - Gibb-Rosenthal (USA) 5280 pts
2 - Emanuel-Alison (Brazil) 5180
3 - Dalhausser-Rogers (USA) 4120
4 - Ricardo-Cunha (Brazil) 3920
     Nummerdor-Schuil (Netherlands) 3920
6 - Marcio-Pedro (Brazil) 3760
7 - Fuerbringer-Lucena (USA) 3640
8 - Erdmann-Matysik (Germany) 3240
9 - Samoilovs-Sorokins (Latvia) 2920
10- Nicolai-Lupo (Italy) 2780

Note: The best eight men's results (75 percent of all 11 men's events) are taken into consideration when calculating the final ranking

World Tour winners:

1989-90 Smith-Stoklos (USA)
1990-91 Smith-Stoklos (USA)
1991-92 Smith-Stoklos (USA)
1992-93 Smith-Stoklos (USA)
1993-94 Franco-Lopes (Brazil)
1994-95 Kvalheim-Maaseide (Norway)
1995-96 Franco-Lopes (Brazil)
1996 Ze Marco-Emanuel (Brazil)
1997 Ze Marco-Emanuel (Brazil)
1998 Para-Guilherme (Brazil)
1999 Emanuel-Loiola (Brazil)
2000 Ze Marco-Ricardo (Brazil)
2001 Emanuel-Tande (Brazil)
2002 Barcetti-Conde (Argentina)
2003 Ricardo-Emanuel (Brazil)
2004 Ricardo-Emanuel (Brazil)
2005 Ricardo-Emanuel (Brazil)
2006 Ricardo-Emanuel (Brazil)
2007 Ricardo-Emanuel (Brazil)
2008 Harley-Pedro (Brazil)
2009 Brink-Reckermann (Germany)
2010 Dalhausser-Rogers (USA)
2011 Emanuel-Alison (Brazil)
2012 Gibb-Rosenthal (USA)