Hitwise, a firm which monitors internet traffic, revealed that www.tickets.london2012.com was the 29th most visited website in Britain as thousands people flocked to buy tickets before the deadline.

The previous week it had not been in the top 500 in the country but increased eightfold in the last week, writes Robin Goad, director of research for Hitwise UK.

The weight of traffic explains why the website slowed in the final hours on Tuesday and London 2012 had to extend by an hour the time available to buy tickets.

"Just focusing on the websites included in our ticketing category, London 2012 Tickets accounted for 67 per cent of all visits to the category, 13 times more traffic than third placed (and usually category leading) Ticketmaster UK," Goad writes.

"With so many sporting spectacles to see, there were no doubt some tough choices to be made regarding which tickets to apply for.

"Looking at the sporting search terms driving traffic to the London 2012 tickets website, it is amazing to see the niche sports that UK Internet users were searching for and the absence of some of the Olympics' most famous events."


Hitwise figures show that the most searched for events on the London 2012 website were gymnastics, the Opening Ceremony and equestrian.

"There is a marked absence of searches for the 100 metres sprint, writes Goad.

"This may be because visitors to the ticketing website already knew what event they wanted to apply for, and therefore used a navigational search term to the London 2012 site, or it may be because they knew some events would be heavily oversubscribed, and instead were looking for different events they might have a better chance of securing tickets for.

"Either way, gymnastics emerges as the number one event that people were searching for when they were looking for Olympic tickets.

"In particular, rhythmic gymnastics proved especially popular.

"Interestingly the top two athlete search terms that were driving traffic to the ticket site were Tom Daley and Jessica Ennis.

"These two have become icons of the 2012 Olympics, and so it is perhaps not surprising their respective disciplines are among the top sports people wanted tickets for."

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