By Devon Hubbard Sorlie

It's dusk down at the beach. Humvees, graders and trucks roll in to prepare for the assault that will begin at daylight. Teams of service members - wearing covert clothing such as shorts and T-shirts so they blend in with the tourists - prepare to execute plans that have been honed to precision.

By nightfall, the exercise will be over. Eighteen blocks of Virginia Beach's prime oceanfront along the boardwalk will be set up for 50 sand soccer fields that will stretch as far as the eye can see. It will become the battleground for the sand warriors at the 12th annual North American Sand Soccer Championships (NASSC).

Started 11 years ago as a fundraiser for the Hampton Roads Soccer Council, the initial sand soccer tournament had 26 teams with players. This year's event boasts a record-setting 725 teams with 7,250 players, who will bring with them fans, family and coaches for as many as 24,000 down to the oceanfront June 10-12.

Teams from 15 states and four countries will descend upon the resort strip for three days of kicking a little sand in their opponents' faces.

None of it would happen without the military, according to Dick Whalen, NASSC director.

Whalen is a soccer enthusiast and a retired Navy captain who is now director of Military Affairs at Old Dominion University. The idea of the sand soccer tournament was to create a fun event where soccer players could take off their shoes and play the game barefooted at the end of the school year.

But as the popularity of the event exploded, the responsibility of setting up more and more soccer fields was too much to ask from civilian volunteers. In 1994, 10 fields were set up. For 2005, it will take at least 50.

So Whalen went to one of his former commands and asked for help. He was able to round up enough volunteers to handle the first few years. But even that job became overwhelming as the event grew bigger, so now the job of military coordinator falls to Chief Personnelman Ron Roberts, who is assigned to the Personnel Support Detachment at Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek.

This year, Roberts has wrangled 75 volunteers from the Airborne Mine Countermeasurers Weapons System Training School; Helicopter Combat Support Squadron 2; Helicopter Mine Countermeasurers Squadron 14; Personnel Support Detachment, and Maritime Force Protection Command.

"It's part of our community service, so we don't have to take leave," Roberts explained. "We enjoy being out at the oceanfront."

Having the military volunteers is crucial to the success of the sand soccer tournament. To contract out for the same services provided free by the Navy volunteers could nearly wipe out the profit the event brings into the Hampton Roads Soccer Complex's coffers each year.

"This is a big fund raiser for the soccer complex," Roberts said. "To not have volunteers from the military, they would have to pay someone to do this, and that would be a big hit to the amount of funds raised. So the military involvement is definitely crucial. This tournament isn't going to happen without them."

Roberts should know. His sons, Brandon, 13, and Cody, 10, both play soccer. A lot of the volunteers also either have children in the tournament or have entered as a military team or through a local community team.

"Through their military jobs or their hobbies, these guys are very good at putting things together," Roberts said. "Some are equipment operators who are licensed to drive the big trucks we need to haul the equipment."

After the initial "invasion" on Wednesday, most of the equipment will be in place on Thursday. Friday is the big day, as goals are set up and the smaller soccer fields are marked off - 50 of them for 18 blocks, about one and a quarter miles in length along the boardwalk.

They'll help maintain the integrity of the fields and equipment throughout the tournament, and then stage the breakdown after the finals on Sunday.

"All told, it's about five man-days to get the stuff down there and set everything up and then take it down," Roberts said. "We'll do it even if it rains, but when it's dry and sunny out, that makes the volunteers a lot happier."

Over the years, the sand soccer tournament has raised more than $925,000 to offset operating expenses for the Hampton Roads Soccer Complex, which is 75 acres containing 19 irrigated fields located in Virginia Beach.

"It's a very mechanized process, almost automated," Whalen said of the military team. "It used to take us working well into the night on Friday. But now, even though it's many times larger, it takes less time because the (military team) has become a well-oiled machine. It will look like an amphibious assault down there. This is a fantastic bunch of volunteers."