American Idol runner-up Clay Aiken could upstage winner Ruben Studdard in the Billboard charts as the pair have released their debut singles on the same day.

Aiken's cover of Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water is reported to be outselling Studdard's Flying Without Wings.

Online retailer Amazon's sales chart puts Aiken at number one, with Studdard trailing at number nine.

Sounds like the UK Pop Idol, the record companies are looking for "IDOL's" in these shows and unfortunataly they dont see Rueben as an IDOL.

Gareth Gates who came 2nd in the UK Idol is now the big star because he was seen as an IDOL by the record compnaies so they they promoted him.

The record compnaies are just after money like any normal business so they go for the most profitable person, which they think is going to be Clay - which is proved in the "Amazon" charts as you say.

Hi All the way from New Zealand here. I was devasted when Reuben was announced the winner - Im 42 by the way. I was upset for days and couldnt rewatch the video for a while. I am so glad that sales have shown that indeed it was clay who had 'the voice' and should have won. I do wonder how Reuben feels about all this. Am not surprised that they have postponed his cd.
Go clay - all they way - can't wait to see his next cd.

I actually keep forgetting that Clay didn't win. He seems to be everywhere. On Tuesday there was an American Idol Christmas special and it was weird when Clay announced Ruben as "your American Idol." Clay is on magazine covers, TV (he performed in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade ... I actually recognized his voice from another room LOL), etc. I haven't seen any of Ruben. But that might change when he releases his album.

BTW, Clay was the host for the Christmas special. He did a bang up job, too.