For the US, Summer Olympics are a USC-fest due to track and field; everything is converted, and you have to go to the Olympic website to get the correct results in metric. In the Winter olympics, most events are times. In ski jump, I never heard the announcers use anything but meters for the length of jump.
The Olympics Committee operates three or four speed guns on the luge, reading in km/h. NBC gets that feed and displays it unchanged on the screen, yet the announcers talk about it (instantly) in miles per hour. Since the speed increases considerably (65 to 145 km/h typically) from the first to last gun, seeing figures in one set of units and hearing them in another, and the cycle repeating for the next contestant leaves you with NO idea of what you've seen/heard. I don't think there are many other events they can ruin in this manner. ________________________________ From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: U.S. Metric Association <[email protected]> Cc: U.S. Metric Association <[email protected]> Sent: Mon, February 15, 2010 4:46:03 PM Subject: [USMA:46656] RE: NBC's Annoying Luge Coverage at the Olympics I'm still not surprised that NBC, as an American network, uses US Customary units as much as possible. However, there has been talk from correspondents in the UK that local coverage oriented towards Britons (rather than a world audience) typically uses Imperial. Can anyone over there tell me which units the local BBC and local media outlets are using to cover the Olympic events? Cheers, Ezra ----- Original Message ----- From: "Martin Vlietstra" <[email protected]> To: "U.S. Metric Association" <[email protected]> Sent: Monday, February 15, 2010 1:31:41 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific Subject: [USMA:46655] RE: NBC's Annoying Luge Coverage at the Olympics At the Athens Olympics, the British woman’s marathon hopeful, Paula Radcilffe was suffering from a stomach bug. Although she led for much of the race, things caught up with her and she visibly got to the 36 km mark (denoted by a huge “36”). She stopped, summoned up strength, and then withdrew a short distance afterwards. Even though millions of Britons saw this on television and the commentator used the word “36 kilometre mark”, the press was divided as to whether she had covered 21 miles, 21.5 miles or 22 miles. ________________________________ From:[email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of John M. Steele Sent: 15 February 2010 00:01 To: U.S. Metric Association Subject: [USMA:46650] NBC's Annoying Luge Coverage at the Olympics In the end, the luge is scored entirely by summing finish times. However, during the run, some split times and speeds are available. The speeds, like everything else are SI, kilometers per hour, and NBC flashes those graphics on screen. Apparently the announcers get instant coversion and yack endlessly in miles per hour while you are looking at on screen graphices in km/h. The disconnect is both annoying and confusing. NBC: Please let have the REAL results. Don't bother converting. (You will be less confused if you mute the announcers and just read on-screen graphics.) Fortunately, there are fewer Winter events they can screw up with unnecessary conversion. compared to the Summer Olympics.
