Could we please stop using only feet and inches for field events in track and field broadcasts?

The US has to keep up with important countries like Liberia and Myanmar.

Keep up the good work!

https://www.statista.com/chart/18300/countries-using-the-metric-or-the-imperial-system/

....and stop with your own spelling of English words, create your own language if you wish.

No 'math', put the 'u's back, stop dumbing down everything

I'm a sesquipedalian, which literally translates to a foot and a half, so I naturally prefer imperial measure to metric. Would metric made any sense in most of your every day life?

Driving?

Cooking?

Construction?

Baseball?

Basketball?

Football?

Golf?

Shopping?

Clothing?

Etc?

Metric us unrelatable. Everybody should speak Murican and measure things in Murican.

Based and malmopilled

I am Sam wrote:

....and stop with your own spelling of English words, create your own language if you wish.

No 'math', put the 'u's back, stop dumbing down everything

We speak a lot of local languages here in Liberia but English is the official language. Not like the US which doesn't have an official language.

Some announcers give it in both measurements. The NCAA site lists both metric and imperial.

sub sub elite local hobby jogger wrote:

Yes, I understand why they show field events in feet and inches, but this is so annoying. Most track and field fans are smart enough to know the meaning of the metric distances. All the running events are measured in meters. The official measurements and flights are done in metric at the NCAA level. They do the sport a disservice by only showing the field events in imperial units. The broadcasts need to stop with this. ESPN, NBC, and whoever else need to stop thinking only idiot Americans are watching the broadcast and that some Americans would appreciate the both the imperial and metric units. The broadcasters are actually making their lives harder because the events are measured in metric and they have to convert them to feet and inches for the broadcast. Just stop with only imperial. It's stupid and outdated.

We'll do that right after a majority of American males are uncircumcised. We're not a bunch of Euros.

They need to show the metric first with the imperial in parentheses.

Sure. Let's take a sport that most US sports fans have trouble understanding and relating to and explain in measurements that those fans don't understand.

In general I agree. Temperature makes way more sense in F than C. It isn’t that tough to be able to use both systems where appropriate. My biggest beef with imperial is when instructions tell you to add some number of ounces of something. Did you mean volume or weight?

sub sub elite local hobby jogger wrote:

Yes, I understand why they show field events in feet and inches, but this is so annoying. Most track and field fans are smart enough to know the meaning of the metric distances. All the running events are measured in meters. The official measurements and flights are done in metric at the NCAA level. They do the sport a disservice by only showing the field events in imperial units. The broadcasts need to stop with this. ESPN, NBC, and whoever else need to stop thinking only idiot Americans are watching the broadcast and that some Americans would appreciate the both the imperial and metric units. The broadcasters are actually making their lives harder because the events are measured in metric and they have to convert them to feet and inches for the broadcast. Just stop with only imperial. It's stupid and outdated.

Besides races run on 400m tracks how many other sports use the metric system. Aren't most sports venues measured in feet and inches like the pitchers mound 60' 6". Yards for football and golf. Miles or fractions thereof for auto racing, ect.

I think I understand your point. But you'd probably have more success trying to get Americans to learn how to push a chain uphill.

trollism wrote:

malmo wrote:

Would metric made any sense in most of your every day life?

Football?

.

Well, they manage it fine in countries you regard as stupid and inferior, so I dunno.

Football is the main thing holding us up. Everyone can figure out kilometers, including the all-American military. Football and its "yard lines" are stubborn.

The Canadians have proven football can be done in meters. If even they can do it, we for sure can. Convince SEC fans this would favor defensive ball, which it would, and they'll switch over.

The metric system is dumb and needs to be replaced everywhere by imperial units. In the US if you look at a cup, you immediately know it's 8oz. Nobody knows that it's also 236.5882365 ccs. Nobody needs that many decimals in their life.

Bad Wigins wrote:

trollism wrote:

Well, they manage it fine in countries you regard as stupid and inferior, so I dunno.

Football is the main thing holding us up. Everyone can figure out kilometers, including the all-American military. Football and its "yard lines" are stubborn.

The Canadians have proven football can be done in meters. If even they can do it, we for sure can. Convince SEC fans this would favor defensive ball, which it would, and they'll switch over.

I never heard this before. How does switching football from yards to meters favor the defensive?

HRE wrote:

Sure. Let's take a sport that most US sports fans have trouble understanding and relating to and explain in measurements that those fans don't understand.

What is your issue in showing both - the official measurement followed by the imperial one?

Star wrote:

They need to show the metric first with the imperial in parentheses.

Plus 1.

Converting miles to kilometers and vice versa is fairly easy as it's roughly a 5/3 ratio. If I read a training schedule and it said 20k with last 5k up tempo I'd run 12 miles and push the last 3.

Meters to feet and inches is just not intuitive. I looked up a high school sectional meet results yesterday and the field event results were listed in meters.

I have no godd®mn idea if a 1.77 meter high jump is 5'-6" or 6'-0". It's 5'-10" btw and now 24 hrs later I know that the HS high jumpers in this area are subpar but I'd rather not have to use a Google conversion tool to figure that out.

malmo wrote:

I'm a sesquipedalian, which literally translates to a foot and a half, so I naturally prefer imperial measure to metric. Would metric made any sense in most of your every day life?

Driving?

Cooking?

Construction?

Baseball?

Basketball?

Football?

Golf?

Shopping?

Clothing?

Etc?

Metric us unrelatable. Everybody should speak Murican and measure things in Murican.

BUT, it's Progressive and stuff. It makes US look better. And it doesn't leave anyone out. Can you see now?

3 man weave wrote:

Star wrote:

They need to show the metric first with the imperial in parentheses.

Plus 1.

Converting miles to kilometers and vice versa is fairly easy as it's roughly a 5/3 ratio. If I read a training schedule and it said 20k with last 5k up tempo I'd run 12 miles and push the last 3.

Meters to feet and inches is just not intuitive. I looked up a high school sectional meet results yesterday and the field event results were listed in meters.

I have no godd®mn idea if a 1.77 meter high jump is 5'-6" or 6'-0". It's 5'-10" btw and now 24 hrs later I know that the HS high jumpers in this area are subpar but I'd rather not have to use a Google conversion tool to figure that out.

I agree with your post. Your last paragraph made me chuckle. So funny yet so true.

HRE wrote:

Sure. Let's take a sport that most US sports fans have trouble understanding and relating to and explain in measurements that those fans don't understand.

Can the average US sports fans relate to the distances involved anyway? If you ask 100 of them to guess the world records for shot put, javelin, etc. I would be flabbergasted if they come within the 10% error caused by blindly replacing "meter" with "yard." Same if you showed them a throw with no markings and asked them to guess the distance.