Lorena Bichucher arrives at Copacabana Beach before seven in the morning, hauling a mesh bag filled with a dozen soccer balls. She pauses by a cluster of coconut palms, letting the balls roll onto the sand.
“We require to practice in the shade. It gets hot quickly,” she says.
By seven o’clock, eight women have gathered to commence their daily training session. The 39-year-old Bichucher divides the group into two teams and launches the balls into the air. The objective isn’t simply keeping the ball aloft, but doing so with creativity and precision. Everything is permitted except the use of hands and arms.
“To increase the excitement, you speed up the pace,” explains Bichucher, a trained physical education teacher.
The ball doesn’t circulate in a set order, either.
“It can go from the first player to the third, to the second, back to the first, to the fourth, and then back to the first. The play should be unpredictable,” Bichucher says.
Among the participants is 33-year-old Beatrice Barbosa. Six years ago, she began playing footvolley, another Brazilian beach sport played over a volleyball net using only feet, knees, shoulders, and head – no hands allowed.
“I needed to lose weight and got hooked on footvolley, but altinha is better. You’re more present,” says Barbosa.
She trains with Lorena Bichucher twice a week.
“My goal is to get so good that I can play with any group of guys on the beach. Right now, I drop the ball too often. It just doesn’t perform,” she laughs.
Still, Bichucher doesn’t want her students to measure themselves against men. She views her school, Empoderalta, as a feminist project.
“Guys think it’s naturally masculine to show off with the ball. They would never go to a school to learn. We girls are more humble.”
She started Empoderalta four years ago, after becoming frustrated with years as a footvolley coach.
“My male colleague was having relationships with all the girls. It just caused a lot of drama. It’s better when the men aren’t around.”
Altinha originated in the late 1960s under the palm grove of Coqueirão on Ipanema Beach in Rio de Janeiro. A group of men who regularly played informal soccer in the sand stopped trying to score and instead began to juggle and pass the ball amongst themselves. Over time, the game spread towards the shoreline, becoming a way for fit men to attract attention. Documentary filmmaker Cecília Lang was just 12 years old when she first became captivated by altinha.
“It was so elegant to watch. Almost like a dance,” says Lang, now 46.
Seven years ago, she began filming “Bola Pro Alto!” (Ball in the Air), a documentary about the beach phenomenon of altinha. She interviewed the men who founded the game and some of those who have carried it forward. The documentary premiered last year and received an honorary award at the international FICTS film festival in Milan.
“For me, altinha is an artistic expression. When it’s at its best, you enter a kind of trance. Almost like meditation,” she says.
Although working on the documentary, she noticed that more and more girls had begun playing altinha.
“It’s almost become a female revolution.”
She also noted that the Brazilian ball game has begun to spread around the world. On the beaches of Australia, altinha is now common. It’s also gaining popularity on the beaches of Barcelona and Tel Aviv.
“It’s a fever that’s spreading. One of the best altinha players in the world is an Italian who learned to play by watching YouTube,” says Lang with a laugh.
In Brazil, competitions have also begun for altinha. Because it’s relatively straightforward for experienced players to keep the ball in the air, groups are judged by a jury based on ball control, rhythm, creativity, variation, precision, difficulty, and personal expression.
“It’s exciting that competitions have started, but I’d like to keep altinha as a way to socialize collectively,” says Lang, who also plays altinha herself.
One of those hoping to see altinha become an Olympic sport is Leonardo Ribeiro, who is ranked as Brazil’s best altinha player. He holds 21 gold medals from various Brazilian competitions. To meet the Olympic committee’s criteria for becoming a sport, it must be practiced in at least 75 countries on four continents. It also requires that women practice the sport in at least 40 countries on three continents.
“It will take time, but the spread around the world has begun, and more and more women are playing. What we lack is a federation that can represent us,” Ribeiro told DN.
The strong local roots in Rio de Janeiro, with its 12 million inhabitants, are even more widespread. During the pandemic, when the beaches were closed, groups of friends began meeting under the old train sheds outside the home arena of the Botafogo soccer club in the Engenho de Dentro suburb. They took the game from the beach to the street, inventing altinha street, altinha on the street. Now, several hundred people gather every Monday in the suburb to juggle the ball under the train shed roofs.
“For me, altinha is therapeutic. I clear my head here every Monday,” says Ana Beatriz Farias, 21.
She always plays with three other guys.
“We’re at the same level. Except sometimes I get the ball on my butt. The guys don’t do that,” she laughs.
On Mondays at the old train sheds, she practices modern skills in preparation for the weekend on the beach.
“The beach is our stage.”
On Sundays, altinha players gather in Leme, the beach next to Copacabana. As the sun begins to set around four o’clock, the shoreline fills with small groups keeping the ball airborne. Occasionally, beachgoers grumble when the ball flies into their towels and personal space, but it’s usually just picked up and tossed back. One of those who often plays here is Mel Moura, 21. She began juggling with a friend four years ago and now plays every weekend – usually with guys.
She doesn’t agree that women are taking over.
“Altinha is still a macho sport. Every time we ask guys on the beach if we can join, they look at us suspiciously,” says Moura.
Friend Diana Nicolau, 21, adds:
“And if we miss a ball, they sigh. It’s like the guys are testing us. But if we pass the test, there are no problems, then we can play for hours,” she says with a smile.
Fact.Altinha
Altinha, which means “the little high” in Portuguese, is a Brazilian ball game where players keep a ball in the air through passes and tricks. It’s played in a circle, with anywhere from 3–6 people, but most often with four. It’s possible to compete in altinha, but primarily it’s a social beach game strongly associated with Rio de Janeiro’s beach life. It’s played barefoot with a volleyball, as a leather ball is too hard on the feet.
