In beach volleyball, a matter of inches can make the difference between the elation of a bronze medal and the despair of a fourth-place finish.Bermuda I’s women Claudia Stich and Allison Lacoursiere found that out the hard way at National Sports Centre, losing the bronze medal match 2-1 to Gotland when Sofia Wahlen’s serve clipped the line to provide the decisive blow in a 16-14 third-set victory.Bermuda won the first set 25-13, but Gotland rallied to tie the match with a 25-13 second-set victory.Wahlen, at 23 making her fourth appearance in the Island Games, partnered with Games rookie Jenny Sander to claim the bronze. Wahlen’s 21-year-old sister, Tove, and her father, Jan, are also representing Gotland’s volleyball teams at the Games.Executing their strategy of getting the ball deep to keep Gotland away from the net, Bermuda controlled the first set. A Lacoursiere kill put Bermuda up 20-13, and Stich finished the set with an unreturnable serve.Gotland rebounded from a 4-0 deficit to dominate the second set, and claimed victory when Stich’s serve at 13-20 sailed wide.The 5’10” Lacoursiere was a force in the final set, both at the net and on serve, as Bermuda battled to stay on even terms with the tenacious Gotland duo.The teams were tied at 12 when a Wahlen block gave Gotland an edge but Lacoursiere’s kill put Bermuda back on even terms. A Wahlen kill set up match point, but Sander’s serve was long to even the set at 14-14.But Stich’s serve sailed long, and Wahlen serving at 15-14 clinched the match on serve.“Our biggest weakness is our heads,” said a disconsolate Lacoursiere. “Sometimes we can play a little hesitantly, but tonight we really came out and gave it our all.”Lacoursiere and Stich were playing in their first tournament together, but have plans to enter some events on the North, Central America and Caribbean Volleyball Federation (NORCECA) tour, an 11-stop circuit operating between March and November.Sander, 34, was making her Island Games debut for Gotland, a province of Sweden situated in the Baltic Sea and having a population of approximately 58,000.The Games were a learning experience for Sander and Wahlen they had practiced together for only three hours before arriving in Bermuda. “Sofia has been teaching me this week,” Sander said. “The third set was very close there weren’t more than two points between the teams at any time. Sometimes, it’s about making fewer mistakes.”In the women’s gold medal match, the Menorca team of Vanesa Ruiz and Maria Bonafont defeated the Cayman duo of Cristin Alexander and Jessica Wolfenden 2-0. The victory was Menorca’s fourth consecutive this week, during which they did not lose a set.The gold is Ruiz’s second in beach volleyball at the Games. She partnered with Montse Cardona to win gold for Menorca in Rhodes six years ago, the only previous time that the sport has been included in the Games.On the men’s side, the Saaremaa duo of Slim Polluaar and Keith Pupart claimed gold with a 2-0 victory over the Cayman I team of Shervin Rankin and Richard Campbell.Rankin was chasing his second beach men’s gold he partnered with Berislav Bobus, who competed for Jersey this week, to win gold for Cayman in 2007.The men’s bronze was won by the Menorca team of Ramon Linares and Jose Maria Olivar, 2-0 (21-11, 21-18) victors over the Cayman II team of Philippe Deslandes and Olney Thompson.