A skimpy bikini would be considered daring attire even for the six million thrill-seekers drawn annually to Blackpool’s pleasure beach. But throw in a bracing average maximum temperature of 16C (61F) and the onset of the year’s wettest months, and it starts to look heroic.

For Lucy Boulton, Denise Johns, Shauna Mullin and Zara Dampney, though, it is all part of the job. As professional beach volleyball players, they brave the elements year-round at their training base at the University of Bath in their quest to qualify for the London Olympics.

Such practised hardiness should put them in good stead this week against Europe’s best players, who descend on Blackpool on Thursday for the English Masters. It is a far cry from the Latin glitz of Copacabana in Rio de Janeiro, but for ten days the Lancashire seaside resort’s famous promenade will be transformed into a mecca for beach volleyball fans to promote a sport fundamentally ill suited to the British climate.

More than 50 teams from 20 countries will compete on five purpose-built courts, including a 2,000-seat show arena, near the iconic tower. The town council is expecting 20,000 visitors for the only opportunity to watch European Tour beach volleyball in Britain. The World Junior Championships follow, starting a week tomorrow.

The events are also a chance for the sport to challenge preconceptions shaped by the minimalist dress code. Jeff Brehaut, director of Beach Volleyball UK and an Olympic referee, said: “People who don’t watch it just think of girls wearing very little messing about on sand, but it’s a serious sport.”

The girls in question rail against chauvinism. Mullin, 24, who has a law degree, said: “On the track, athletes are wearing just as little. The only difference is they’re in trainers.” She has a point, although her bikini bottoms are considerably skimpier — the regulation maximum width is 7cm — than athletics briefs.

The players accept the “sex’n’sand” image as a means to an end. Introduced in 1996 at the Atlanta Games, the sport saved its comparatively dull indoor cousin from Olympic exclusion. The International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) estimates that its beach tournaments reach 620 million households and the potential rewards — top-ten players can earn more than £300,000 a year — are high for a minority sport.

“If people come to watch it for the girls in bikinis and see world-class athletes competing, they’ll come back for the right reasons,” Boulton, 23, said.

There is no doubting their athleticism. To walk into a room of beach volleyball players is to feel weedy: the men are 6ft 4in on average, the women nearly 6ft, with washboard stomachs. Diving across 128 square metres of sand for two hours, they require stamina similar to tennis players.

As hosts, one men’s and one women’s pair from Great Britain will get wild cards, but all four pairs aim to compete before a home crowd in Horse Guards Parade during the London Games.

Matt Grinlaubs, a former Australia player who coaches the Great Britain team, believes that he can produce a medal in 2012 despite a halving of funding after Beijing last year. “There was a time when other players would be pleased to get a British team in the draw, but not now,” he said. “We’re making progress and will be world-class.”

Only Boulton and Johns — the No 1 women’s pair — have a sponsor and estimate they earned about £6,000 each in prize money last year, on top of about £7,000 in lottery funding. The rest get by with subsidies from family and friends.

“You don’t earn a ton of money but you travel to some great places,” said Steve Grotowski, 27, a genial London-born Floridian in a men’s pair with Gregg Weaver. Whether he was counting Blackpool is unclear.

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