----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday, 2004-08-22 19:16
Subject: [USMA:30821] RE: "Metrics"
USA
athletes seem to have no trouble with metric measure for swimming, foot races,
etc.
Because they don't have to think about it. They run or
swim a fixed distance as fast as they can. I saw on the Today Show (NBC)
one day last week where one of the female swimmers was talking with Katie
Curic and never said the word "metres". It was the 200 this and the 400
that, etc. I would think if the swimmers and track atheletes would
actually have to confront metric they would freak out
too.
Why
the hangup with long jump and pole vaulting, I have no idea. And the
networks do not help one bit by continuing this garbage.
Well, as you see below, when an announcer states a distance in
metric, there is no responce. As soon as they speak feet and inches the
crowd wakes up. So much for learning metric in school. Either the
schools are not teaching it as much as we want to believe, or they are
teaching it wrong, or the kids are just forgetting it as soon as they
can. either way it is a national
shame.
To
this athlete, all I can say is waa, waa, waa to his excuses. The reason
he didn't jump as far is because he wasn't as good.
You are referring to the guy in one of the
other posts. But, I agree no pity for the loser. If he can't
relate to metric, that is his fault.
The
idiots who perpetuate feet and inches in these two events should be told flat
out to quit it and to get with the program.
Those who don't know the metric system
should be barred from the olympics. Why should the IOC have to deal with a
bunch of luddites? During training, only metres should be used and the
players and coaches should be punished or shamed if they try to work in
FFU. This is America going before the world and it is untolerable if our
people shame the nation by looking ignorant before the whole
world.
Carleton
Euric
It seems the use of the metric system in world sports
is upsetting to many Americans. So much for the Olympics teaching the
Americans about metric or about Americans understanding what is happening
when something is given in metres.
David Noble, high school and college stand-out in track
who spent nearly 40 years as one of the nation's most respected coaches (the
Angelo State Relays now are named in his honor), thinks one of the most
tragic mistakes made in his sport came in 1976. That's when the United
States and Great Britain "pulled the plug" on the English system of
measuring distances. They felt the metric system closing in.
"It wasn't smart," he insists. "Few Americans will take
the time to equate metrics to yards, feet and inches." A dozen years ago,
Southwest Texas State's Charles Austin was about to try a record high jump
in San Angelo. The public address announcer droned that he was attempting a
jump of 2.23 meters. The crowd yawned.
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"Somebody tell him that he's going for 7 feet, 3
inches," Noble urged, and when the announcer changed it to feet and inches,
the fans rushed closer to the jumping pit. (Austin cleared it, and later was
a world champion at 7-8. He won Olympic gold in 1996 on his third try at
7-10, or, if you prefer, 2.4 meters. Anyway, it was nearly two feet above
his head!)
Meanwhile, metrics are being held at bay in other
sports. You might hear a football announcer say, "Third and long," but never
"third and 1.1 meter."
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http://www.brownwoodbulletin.com/articles/2004/08/22/opinion/opinion07.txt
