Mollie O’Callaghan and Ariarne Titmus won the gold and silver in the women’s 200-metre freestyle at the Paris Olympics and Australia turned out to watch, bringing in big results for Channel Nine.
O’Callaghan set a new Olympic record in the process of winning gold, beating Titmus’ time by a few tenths of a second which she set at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Nine had the top three shows in the OzTAM overnight TV ratings with its two late-night shows placing first (total TV reach: 5.4 million; average audience: 2 million; average BVOD audience 287,000) and second (total TV reach: 4.3 million; average audience 1,8 million; BVOD average audience: 275,000).
Its 7-9pm show topped the table and saw Aussie swimmers Kyle Chalmers, O’Callaghan and Shayna Jack power through their 100m freestyle heats, while Kaylee McKeown and Iona Anderson battled it out in their 100m backstroke semi-final, finishing first and third. The action in the pool also saw the Australian men’s 4x200m freestyle team book their place in the final by posting the fourth-fastest time of the heats.
Its 9-10.30pm show placed second and saw the Boomers take on Canada in the Men’s Basketball preliminary round, and two-time Olympian Natalya Diehm ride her way to the BMX Freestyle final.
Nine’s 3-7pm show saw Jess Fox secure her place in the Canoe Slalom final as Australian took on USA in the women’s Rugby sevens — it placed third in the ratings and drew a total TV reach of 3.2 million; average audience: 679,000; BVOD average audience: 95,000.
In fact, Nine held the top seven spots in the ratings by total TV reach. Its Today In Paris show placed sixth, while 9News (total TV reach: 2.9 million; average audience: 1.5 million; BVOD average audience: 200,000) beat Seven News (total TV reach: 2.1 million; average audience: 1.4 million; BVOD average audience 68,000), placing fourth and eighth, respectively.
Even Nine’s early morning and Paris Encore shows placed ninth and 10th.
All told, some nearly 9.9 million people tuned into Nine’s Olympics coverage.
Home and Away was Seven’s top entertainment show, placing 11th. Ten’s Dogs Behaving (Very) Badly placed 25th.
The ABC’s I Was Actually There placed 26th. There was no SBS show in the top 30.
The Olympics, perhaps unsurprisingly, has proven a ratings bonanza for Nine. Over the past three days, Nine has locked out at least the top five places in the overnight ratings list.
