Organizers asked to open up route to spectators

BEIJING (Reuters) - Olympic officials have been asked to open up the roads to more cycling spectators on Sunday after the International Cycling Union (UCI) complained over-exuberant security had marred the finish to the men's race.

Spain's Samuel Sanchez won the first Olympic cycling gold medal event on Saturday, beating out Italy's Davide Rebellin, but there were fewer than expected fans to watch the dramatic finish with security barring spectators from much of the 245-km route.

"The lack of public on the roadside is a concern we share and we had discussed it with the organizing committee before the Games started," UCI president Pat McQuaid told Reuters. "The subject was even raised at an IOC meeting this morning.

"I'm on the women's race right now and there are huge crowds in the city itself like there were yesterday with the men.

"But it all changes when we reach the final circuit and the roads have been closed to the public.

"We did not expect huge crowds like in the mountain stages of the Tour de France but certainly people should have more access to the circuit.

"We have asked the organizing committee to take measures to improve the situation and we're confident it will improve by Wednesday for the time trial."

Cyclists were not the only athletes to compete in relative obscurity on Saturday.

Basketball and volleyball players battled in front of clumps of empty seats, leaving athletes and officials wondering what has happened to all the spectators at the sold-out Beijing Olympics.

With demand so great a stampede was triggered when the last of the 6.8 million tickets went on sale, the sight of empty seats was not expected.

"It's disappointing for the athletes," John Coates, president of the Australian Olympic Committee told reporters.

"Every Olympic event like the beach volleyball yesterday deserves a full house. I was very surprised."

EMPTY SEATS

The sight of empty seats appeared to catch Beijing organizers by surprise, BOCOG vice-president Wang Wei placing the blame on corporate sponsors and the media for failing to occupy their seats.

"As a tradition sponsors and media have seats reserved at the preliminaries, sometimes they may come up," said Wang. "Also some sports they have one ticket for the whole morning or evening.

"For example tonight we have basketball and the first part is Australia verses someone and the second we have China-American. People who have tickets may be more interested in China-America, they may not turn up for the first one."

Many events been playing to full houses.

Gymnastics and boxing have pulled in near capacity crowds while American Michael Phelps was cheered on to his first gold medal of the Games by a sell-out at the futuristic Water Cube.

Yao Ming can also expect the raucous support from a packed arena when China takes on the United States in men's basketball later on Sunday.

(Additional reporting by Francois Thomazeau, Deborah Charles, editing by Miles Evans)

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