Well, college Outdoor Track & Field is underway. It is time for the annual
rant about a sport which is entirely metric internally but emphasizes feet/inch
conversion to report to the audience and the media. NCAA-sanctioned meets MUST
measure the field events (jumps and throws) in metric (to the lsser whole
centimeter), but they require posting the imperial conversion to the audience
and media, but allow supplemental posting of the REAL measurement. As a
result, event coverage varies widely.
As an example, three articles from the same meet at Georgia Tech (I have no
connection) show the variability.
Georgia Tech is a model of good reporting (well, the feet/inches COULD be
dropped entirely). They have a link to the official results at the top of the
article, and report field events in primary metric, with (supplemental imperial
conversion). In the official results, it is MUCH easier to understand the bar
progression for pole vault and high jump. Each athlete's best performance is
converted to imperial by the sport's strange rounding ruules. Kudoes! :)
http://www.ramblinwreck.com/sports/m-track/recaps/033112aaa.html
Official results:
http://www.ramblinwreck.com/sports/m-track/stats/2011-2012/yellow-jacket-results.html
Middle Tennessee State reports the imperial in the primary position, but at
least adds the (metric) for field events. :|
http://www.goblueraiders.com/content.cfm/id/60087
University of Georgia, Athens: Metric? What's that? Isn't that some
measurement system used by Communists? It is particularly sad on long throws
(discus, javelin, hammer) as two or three centimeter marks convert to the same
inch mark, so you can't recover what the athlete really accomplished, or even
who won in some cases. Brickbats :(
http://www.goblueraiders.com/content.cfm/id/60087
When the Olympics start this summer, we can look forward to NBC providing the
same approximate conversions to us, and hiding the true performance.
