Mariafe Artacho del Solar


Mariafe Artacho del Solar is an Australian beach volleyball player. She represented Australia at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Artacho del Solar plays as a right-side defender. According to the Women's FIVB World Rankings, she and partner Taliqua Clancy are ranked 5th as of 21 January 2020.

Early life

Artacho del Solar moved with her mother from Lima, Peru to Sydney when she was 11 years old. She attended Killara High School, where she met her future Rio Olympics Beach Volleyball partner Nicole Laird.
Artacho del Solar was then offered an AIS Scholarship with the Beach Volleyball program in 2012 which saw her move to Adelaide, South Australia in which the Australian Beach Volleyball Program is located.

Professional career

Rio de Janeiro – 2016 Olympics

Artacho del Solar made her Olympic debut at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro with then partner Nicole Laird. The pair did not win a match in Rio, losing to the US, Switzerland and China in their preliminary pool matches to finish the tournament in 19th place.

Gold Coast – 2018 Commonwealth Games

Artacho del Solar participated in the 2018 Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast with partner Taliqua Clancy. The duo won their 3 preliminary pool matches without losing a set, with wins over Greece's Manolina Konstantinou and Mariota Angelopoulou, Grenada's Renisha Stafford and Thornia Williams, and Scotland's Lynne Beattie and Melissa Coutts. Finishing top of their pool, they advanced to the quarter-finals, where they defeated Rwanda's Charlotte Nzayisenga and Denyse Mutatsimpundu to advance to the semi-finals. After winning the opening set of their semi-final against Vanuatu's pairing of Linline Matauatu and Miller Pata, the duo lost their first set of the tournament to send the match to the decider, which they won to advance to the gold medal match. At the gold medal match, the duo lost to Canada's Melissa Humana-Paredes and Sarah Pavan to take home the silver medal.

FIVB World Tour 2019

Artacho del Solar and Clancy are currently competing on the FIVB World Tour around the world. The pair have already won a Bronze in Xiamen, China and Gold in the Asian Beach Volleyball Championships at Maoming. They competed at the 2019 Beach Volleyball World Championships in Hamburg, Germany from 28 June to 7 July, winning bronze. Due to an injury to Artacho del Solars' left knee the pair had 3 months off before competing again towards the end of 2019 in which they won Gold at the Chetumal, Mexico 4 star.