london2012

Website crashes as trials tickets released

With more than a passing resemblance to the second stage Olympic ticket sale, the ticket sales website for Britain’s Olympic trials crashed earlier today as it failed to cope with the level of demand for seats in the Stratford aquatic centre next March. Visitors were left unable to pay for tickets as the site became unresponsive or in some cases were told that their purchase had failed only to receive a confirmation email, leaving them unsure as to their success.

British Swimming had operated a pre-registration scheme whereby fans could register their intent to purchase tickets, allowing them earlier access to the ticket sale. It was this release of tickets to pre-registered fans that led to the difficulties which ultimately led to website theticketsellers.co.uk closing down.

Earlier in the day there were complaints that the exclusive access links set out to registered users were not functioning correctly.

British Swimming apologised to those caught up in the chaos, blaming “technical difficulties”. Amongst those experiencing trouble were Olympic hopefuls Dan Sliwinski and Thomas Haffield who had been attempting to purchase seats for their families.

Clearly the opportunity to visit the pool was too good to miss for many who missed out on Olympic tickets while the huge demand shows that the first competition to be held in the new Olympic pool has caught the imagination of the swimming public. This should mean that the trials will avoid the fate of many national competitions which take place in almost deserted pools. However, that thought will do little to placate those who spent hours unable to purchase tickets.

The ticket sale opens to the public next week.