Recently there have been posts related to units used in measuring. Maybe this post deviates some from the theme of the others, but it is something I think about, usually when reading Pete Reigel's and other comments here.
Since we started measuring 20 years ago, no race director has expressed interest in anything metric. Some have requested that kilometer markings not be used, regardless of the race distance. The 5 km markings we made for a marathon were really a waste of time. Maybe its just in eastern Connecticut that the metric units are unwelcome. Jim Gerweck uses them in the western part (more civilized?) of the state.
I have nothing against metric units and understand that we're supposed to be moving toward their use. However, since none of the work we've done required or desired metric units, we are in the habit of measuring in counts/mile and miles (out to 5 decimals) and adjusting in feet and inches. Anything else requires extra conversions, in our case. All the calibration courses we've set up are 1,000 feet, the only metric cal course we've used was one of our 1,000-ft courses re-established at 300 meters by Jim Gerweck after repaving.
Using the 300 meter cal course caused conversions in our calculations to get back to counts/mi. We could have measured the whole course in counts/km, but old habits die hard. This is especially true when measuring a half marathon and a 5-km, 3-hours from home. The added uncertainty is not needed.
Getting back to the thread of the units theme, we always measure and calculate in counts/mi, miles, feet and inches.
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