Australian star Jess Hull has qualified for the 1500m semi-finals, but fans were left fuming after Channel 9 failed to show the race live.
The three heats for the 1500m featured three Aussies, including medal hope Hull, who was scheduled for the third of three heats.
Hull came into the Olympics in hot form, smashing her personal best in the 1500m by five seconds and recording the fifth-fastest time in history just last month.
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She also set a new world record in the 2000m, which isn’t an event that’s run at the Olympics, so fans were desperate to see the 27-year-old in action.
As the heats were scheduled for 6.05pm AEST, Channel 9 had the news on their main channel, which relegated the athletics to secondary channel 9Go!
Fans were able to watch Aussie Georgia Griffith qualify from the first heat with a fourth-placed finish before seeing Linden Hall miss out on automatic qualification in the second heat.
But with Hull about to hit the track, the broadcaster decided to show a snippet from the equestrian before showing a full replay of men’s surfing final from earlier this afternoon.
Channel 9’s digital streaming service 9Now offers live action of every sport so fans could have watched Hull there, but that didn’t stop viewers venting their frustrations.
“Disgraceful Channel 9, Jess Hull is racing, top hope and you cut to go to equestrian and rock climbing. Ridiculous decision,” one fan tweeted.
“Channel 9 cutting to a surfing replay over showing Jess Hull’s 1500m heat live might just be the stupidest s*** I’ve ever seen in sports producing in my life,” another said.
“Um Channel9, Jessica Hull in the 1500m is Australia’s biggest athletics news story this Olympics and you just cut away from her first race?? Embarrassing,” another added.
“Did I miss something, Channel9, but did you not play Jess Hulls race live & cut to a reply of surfing?” another added.
“Embarrassing decision-making Channel9. Very disappointed fans here,” another said.
Channel 9 eventually showed the heat at around 7.10pm — over 30 minutes after it was run — on their main channel.
“I think I worked it out. Because the broadcast is currently on 9Go with news on Ch9 primary, they are going to wait to show the replay as soon as the news finishes and try to pretend it’s live,” one fan noted.
On the track, Hull did enough to safely progress to the semi-finals.
She settled in at the front of the pack and stayed out of trouble to cruise to second place behind Kenyan Nelly Chepchirchir.
Hull was well down on her personal best (3:50.83) with a time of 4:02.70, but that didn’t bother her in the slightest.
“I just wanted to run a clean round and stay out of trouble. To me, that’s on the shoulder of the leader. Not in the washing machine of the pack. A good start,” she told Channel 9 after the race.
The 27-year-old is thriving under expectation of snaring Australia’s first Olympic track medal since Sally Pearson’s famous 100m hurdles gold at the 2012 London Games.
“I have to trust my prep, I can’t fault it at all,” Hull said after clocking four minutes 02.70 seconds in her heat.
“I have been healthy. I have hit every workout, I’m really fit, I have got great races behind me.
“That makes me confident. I couldn’t be in a better position coming in.
“So now it’s just time to unlock that.”
Also Tuesday morning, Brooke Buschkuehl’s best long jump of 6.31 metres wasn’t enough to book a berth in the final.
Australia’s Cameron McEntyre’s top javelin throw of 81.18m failed to move him into the final.
Tayleb Willis clocked 13.67 seconds in the men’s 110m hurdles repechage and didn’t reach the semi-finals and Ellie Beer failed to advance from the women’s 400m repechage, finishing in 51.65.
Calab Law didn’t start in the men’s 200m repechage, preferring to focus on the 4x100m relay.
– With AAP
