Competition will reach its climax with 32 teams fighting for spots in the elimination round

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USA's Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena will have a massive support playing in Fort Lauderdale

The draw for the pools of the 2018 Fort Lauderdale Major resulted in some interesting matchups for Wednesday’s main draw with the 32 teams who earned the right of competing in the first Beach Major Series event of 2018 being allocated in eight groups.

Local heroes Phil Dalhausser and Nick Lucena of the USA were slotted on Pool A and they will make their debut against Norwegian qualifiers Henrik Mol and Mathias Bernsten. The group will also have an interesting Canadian meeting between the teams of Sam Pedlow/Sam Schachter and Ben Saxton/Grant O’Gorman in the first round.

Ondrej Perusic and David Schweiner of Czech Republic, who eliminated reigning champions Alvaro Filho and Saymon Barbosa on the qualification tournament, will start their first-ever Beach Major Series main draw appearance on Pool B, where they will face another Brazilian team in world champions Evandro Goncalves and Andre Loyola. US home team of Jake Gibb and Taylor Crabb and Belgian up-and-comers Tom van Walle and Dries Koekelkoren complete the group.

World champions Evandro and Andre of Brazil are the favorites in Pool B

Tough competition is also expected on Pool E, with Olympic vice-champions Paolo Nicolai and Daniele Lupo of Italy facing US wildcards Casey Patterson and Stafford Slick and Latvian stars Aleksandrs Samoilovs and Janis Smedins clashing with Polish Grzegorz Fijalek and Michal Bryl.

Pool H will feature four new teams for the 2018 season. Brazilian qualifiers Pedro Solberg and George Wanderley will meet Italy’s Alex Ranghieri and Marco Caminati while the Netherlands’ Christiaan Varenhorst and Jasper Bouter will measure up with Latvia’s Martins Plavins and Edgards Tocs.

You can check all the pools and the complete schedule here.

Modified pool play system

The #FTLMajor will be the first Beach Major Series event to have the modified pool play system in use. In this model, each team play just twice instead of the usual three – meaning one less demanding match for the beach elite.

It begins with the the top seeded team playing the lowest ranked pairing in the group, and the second- and third-seeded teams in the pool meeting each other in the first round of matches, called the Pool Opener.

The winning teams from both games will then face-off for the right to be named pool winners to secure a place in the second knockout stages in the Pool Showdown, with the losers of that match guaranteed a place in the first elimination round.

The losing pairs from the opening matches then go head-to-head for the right to stay in the tournament in the Pool Survivor. The winning team from that game advance to the first elimination round while the losers are sent home having lost both of their matches.

All matches of the Fort Lauderdale Major can be watched live on BeachStream. Register here and follow every play of the first Beach Major Series event of 2018.