THE BBC will not broadcast Keely Hodgkinson’s world record attempt this weekend on their main channels in a stunning snub. Team GB’s 800 metres Olympic champion is aiming to run the fastest time over the distance indoors on Saturday at the Utilita Arena in Birmingham. The feat is the headline act of the inaugural Keely Klassic and other top British stars will be involved across the six-hour hybrid athletics/entertainment meeting.
![[Keely Hodgkinson holding the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/NINTCHDBPICT000958175560_eb2802.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
It will be her first appearance in running conditions since the Paris 2024 Olympics when she became Britain’s tenth female track-and-field winner in history. Yet TV bosses are not showcasing the 4.30pm race on BBC1 or BBC2 and it has been squirrelled away instead on the BBC iPlayer – away from casual viewers. BBC1 will be showing Blue Planet II – the Green Seas episode was first broadcast on November 26, 2017 – before Final Score, the football results programme, starts at 4.30pm.
Around the same time, BBC2 will show a repeat of the 2022 historical drama Mr Malcolm’s List and then it is an old episode of antiques show Flog It!. The failure to give her event prominence is surprising given that Hodgkinson, 22, was crowned Sports Personality of the Year by the BBC last December. Hodgkinson’s success at the Stade de France last August was the BBC’s most watched event of the last Olympics with 9.1 million viewers tuning in to see her glory over two laps.
