I was running the Tatton 10K today with my sister in law and when we went past a marker she expressed a preference for races measured in miles. I argued that I preferred kilometers as my attention span wasn’t long enough for imperial measurements.
Does anyone else prefer the instant gratification of the metric system?
I prefer the uniformity and predictability of it (I don’t think we were even taught anything in imperial for most of my education), also when returning to the UK the sign that says the destination and a number always leads to disappointment.
Even using a 1:50k map I might use the 1k squares to guestimate a distance but I’ll then convert it to miles in my head to get a feel for how far it is.
I weigh 16 & 1/2 stone and have no idea my height in cm.
I can pretty much convert back and forth without any hassle. The only time I use miles is sometimes talking to other folk who can’t visualise kilometres or if touring on the road in the UK as that just keeps some consistency with road signs.
I’m finding myself switching over to km for more things, walking and cycling definitely. Still think of road speed and distance in miles but that’s about it. 53
when I bought my garmin last year I put it in kilometres, didn’t really ponder why but everything else is in metric so why not road distance? Pro road races are all quoted in km as are audax
I still tend to convert to miles in my head (and mph), but no longer even have a computer measuring in miles on my road bike. Though given I sometimes ride timetrials then some rides are measured in miles. Given I’ve done a lot of navigation based racing on maps with km squares it just became easier not to have to convert – have always had the bike computer on the MTB measuring in km.
They key here is consistency if the distance is in miles then ascend in metres, if the distance in km then ascent in feet. Window openings are 4ftwide by 1200mm etc
I’m interchangeable. Schooled in both, but the industry I work in still works in Imperial. I can’t get too excited by it, when chatting with some mates who are metricised i’ll happily converse in KM’s and other mates who still talk miles i’ll happily convert over. Just like talking a different language I guess. But then I like quirky things.
I guess most people are still using PSI for tyre pressures are they? or have some converted to Bar/Pascals?
Metric for everything, height, weight, distance, running, cycling, driving the lot.
The only conversion then is UK road signs which is pia but not difficult.
Imperial is silly, when I rule the world we will have decimal time and calendars.
Oh, and what’s with Americans and cups! Fine when your forebears were travelling (correct spelling) across the wild west but now that you have settled down and have multiple instances of every labour saving device known to man it seems that you can’t afford a set of weighing scales!