Miles or Km's? which do you use to record a ride?

[Gravity Aided]

I ride the miles, but am aware of the kilometers.

 

[Rasmus]

Miles for me, can't say I know why other than it's what I've always done.

My brother likes talking in KMs and I just smile and nod. I know the standard distances 5k/3 miles. 10k/6 miles, 20k/12 miles but anything else requires a more complicated than neccessary long winded mental arithmetic process - cue nodding and smiling.

That gets pretty inaccurate, though. 10km is actually 6.2 miles, so for longer distances you end up being quite far off. It's better the other way - 5 miles is almost exactly 8 km.

Easy conversion "mental math" method for any milage: Take the distance in miles and add half of it on top. The take 1/10th of the original mileage and add that to the total. Eg 7 miles is 7+3.5+0.7=11.2 km

When I'm doing km to miles conversions in my head, I tend to guess a mile number that is close, work out what that comes to, and then adjust down/up as necessary.

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

kms - got too used to it whilst on tour for 12 months abroad...
now it seems natural and works better with height in meters... and yes, I do have to remind myself which side of the road to cycle on especially after coming off all the single track lanes I cycle!

 

[SpaCyclist]

Both, but mainly Km.
The main reason is Ordnance Survey maps. I plan both walks and rides using the OS grid as a rough guide to distance. When I am out I will use the grid on my gps display to quickly look at how far it is to the next turn. However, when I get back, I do tend to work out roughly how far I went in miles as well. I have left Strava showing Km for distance and m for height which ties in with the way my gps is displaying things.

 

[jefmcg]

That gets pretty inaccurate, though. 10km is actually 6.2 miles, so for longer distances you end up being quite far off. It's better the other way - 5 miles is almost exactly 8 km.

Easy conversion "mental math" method for any milage: Take the distance in miles and add half of it on top. The take 1/10th of the original mileage and add that to the total. Eg 7 miles is 7+3.5+0.7=11.2 km

You think that is easier than multiplying by 8 and dividing by 5? (7*8=56/5=11.1) And going the other way is just as easy.

I guess we all have different ways of understanding numbers.

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

Leagues.

Miles really. Having a go at the metric century a month challenge has made me a bit more au fait with metric distances but I prefer to stick with Imperial.

 

[Hacienda71]

Links, perches and chains for me.

 

[Mo1959]

Links, perches and chains for me.

Lol. My dad way back in his young days was a fencing and drainage contractor and did drains by the chain at that time.

 

[ayceejay]

Lol. My dad way back in his young days was a fencing and drainage contractor and did drains by the chain at that time.

No doubt a lot of the land he was working on was measured that way so it makes sense and I know people who still use those terms (and rod) when fencing.

 

[Glow worm]

At my work, when claiming for mileage, you have the choice of claiming in KMs or miles. I've noticed recently that a third category has popped up- Swedish Miles. I'd never heard of them before but a Swedish (or Scandinavian) mile is apparently 10km or 6.2 miles. We must be recruiting a lot of Scandinavians now or something.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_mile#undefined

 

[Profpointy]

km is small "k" - just sayin' like

 

[MisterStan]

Miles.

Winter kilometers = summer smiles - just sounds wrong.

 

[User16625]

I have found parsecs more useful for longer rides.

I prefer nanometers. The numbers are always bigger and therefore sound more impressive. Not sure how far a parsec is, how many nanometers are there in a parsec?

Seriously tho I only use miles.

 

[Asa Post]

I prefer nanometers. The numbers are always bigger and therefore sound more impressive. Not sure how far a parsec is, how many nanometers are there in a parsec?

1 nanometre is 3.24077929 × (10 raised to the power -26) Parsecs (sorry, can't do superscripts in this editor)

Here to help

 

[citybabe]

I only use miles. Can't get my head around km's