Question for swimming experts ...

All week I've been editing Swim Trials stories that say things like: so-and-so won by "two one-hundredths of a second" or "nine one-hundredths of a second."
So, of course, I edit them to say "two-hundredths of a second" or "nine-hundredths of a second."
Now tonight, I'm watching the Trials on TV (first I've watched this week) and the announcers are saying it the former way: "two one-hundredths", "nine one-hundredths."

Is there some secret swimming code that requires the redundancy?

They don't say three one-tenths of a second or eight one-tenths of a second ... or even six one-thousandths of a second, etc.

 

Wouldn't the proper style be numerical regardless? So 0.02 seconds or 0.09 seconds?

 

You're re-editing it wrong. "Two-hundredths of a second" would make that the unit of measurement -- as in, somebody won by a two-hundredth of a second, which obviously is not the case. "Two hundredths of a second" would be correct, and "two one-hundredths of a second" is not a bad idea just to avoid confusion.

 

Maybe my question was too complicated. Here's a simpler version:
Is there any difference in "two-hundredth of a second" and "two one-hundredths of a second?"

 

Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

 

Yes. The first would not be hyphenated. If it's hyphenated it means 1/200 seconds as opposed to 2/100 seconds. So it's either "two hundredths of a second" or "two one-hundredths of a second."


Edit: I'm sure they add the "one-" to avoid that confusion. There is no such confusion with the word "tenths."

 

The thousandsths of a second try just as hard

 

If it's less than one it's spelled out I think (or that's what a copy editor yelled at me).

 

Yes, that's the way I learned it, fractions are spelled out when less than one. To hyphenate or not is what's bothering me.

They don't use that ### one-hundredths thing in motors or track, only seen it with swimming.
It's probably just the announcers embellishing it -- TWO ONE-HUNDREDTHS OF A SECOND, kinda like GRAND SLAM HOME RUN ... and the writers follow suit.

 

Or, it's what everyone else above you said, in that two-hundredths of a second and two one-hundredths of a second are not the same amount of time.

Whichever.

 

Is there a difference between a run and one run?

 

Da man has it right. There is a difference. One two-hundredth of one second is less than two one-hundredths of a second.

Also, to address the written form, you would be amazed at how many people -- even swimming writers -- think 0.02 seconds is the way to write two tenths of a second.

So, they say it, correctly, to differentiate.