BEACH VOLLEYBALL: Victoria’s Josh Court and Damien Schumann have continued their red hot 2016 form with a third consecutive title for the Australian summer – but they were made to work for it.

Court and Schumann saved two match points to beat Western Australia’s Casey Grice and Cole Durant 18-16 in the third set of the Australian Championships, to add to the South Australian and Queensland titles in recent weeks.

“That was brutal,” Court said.

“Two match points down, I wasn’t sure we were going to get it done. I think we’ve found a bit of form.

“The last three weeks have been stepping stones. Working in Adelaide with the Volleyroos, we’ve been pushing each other.”

World U23 champions Nikki Laird and Mariafe Artacho del Solar had a convincing win in the women’s gold medal match, beating European challengers Michaela Vorlova and Lucia Michalovicova in straight sets.

It was a first Australian Championship title for Laird, but back-to-back titles for del Solar after clinching last year’s title with 2012 Olympian, Becchara Palmer

Earlier on Sunday Court and Schumann beat three-time Olympian, Josh Slack, and former Danish international Bo Soderberg in straight sets to book their place in the gold medal match.

Grice and Durant came out on top against former Australian number ones, Chris McHugh and Isaac Kapa, in a three set thriller that went to 21-19 in the third.

Despite their form this summer, Court and Schumann are refusing to think about a place at the Rio Olympics, preferring to focus on the qualification process through the Continental Cup.

“We’ve got a culture with the men’s program that we’re all just trying as hard as we possibly can to make each other better,” Schumann said.

“We’ve just got to do whatever we can to improve the quality of the men’s team, and push whoever it is when it comes to Continental Cup time.”

Laird and Artacho del Solar will also be relying on the Continental Cup in Australia in June to book a spot in Rio.

“We’ve been talking a lot about our prep for the Continental Cup, and how we want to go in their and leave in first place and that being the only option, and that was the same approach here,” Laird said.

“We don’t go a day without talking about Rio, we talk more about that than anything else,” del Solar said.

ROSS SOLLY FOR VOLLEYBALL AUSTRALIA