Stopwatches And Their Many Uses

By Oliver Richard

Stopwatches have many uses, but nonetheless the main function is to keep and measure time. This is why coaches, athletes and sports times use stopwatches to set up time indications or keep track of progress by using the clocked times for future reference. However, other types of stopwatches also have other purposes.

Used for timing many different sport activities, the stopwatch is just a small device that you hold in your hand and it is handy enough to do evaluations for training. They are used commonly for track and field, motor and car racing and swimming.

Normally, a stopwatch is started manually during the start of an event, and then stopped whenever the said event is over. An example of this is when a runner runs towards a given distant point, the stopwatch is pressed once. When the runner has reached the destination, the stopwatch is pressed again to mark the time in which it took the runner to get there. Coaches and trainers use stopwatches to assess the performance of their athlete.

A stopwatch can either have analog or digital technology. It usually resembles a small pocket watch but some designs are made to be worn on the wrist. The big clocks that you see in arenas such as basketball and hockey stadiums are called stop clocks (just in case you're wondering).

A digital stopwatch is probably more accurate than the traditional analog silver stopwatch (they're usually the ones with classical designs such as silver casings and such). A classical analog stop watch is an ideal gift for coaches or trainers who've just won a championship event of some sort. In fact, winning teams of high school or college students often do this.

Depending on the design and model, a more modern stopwatch can have a lot of functions, modes, and other features. However, this doesn't mean that the traditional stopwatch is rendered obsolete. A conventional stopwatch still serves its true purpose of doing countdowns, recording running times, and lap times. On the other hand, modern stopwatches have features that allow for easier access and better accuracy apart from the basic functions of keeping track of individual laps and events to accumulate overall evaluations.

There are stopwatch models that allow for storing records of up to 50 lap times, while others only hold up to 10. Other digital designs allow for calculation of speed and time as long as the distance of a lane or track is known. This is done by entering the distance into the stopwatch. The watch then evaluates the previous records of the athlete and will come up with an average time of how many minutes or seconds it would take to cover the given distance.

First and foremost the stopwatch's number one function is to be a countdown timer and this is achieved by counting down to zero and entering a certain amount of time and then pressing a button. They are commonly used by coaches, trainers and athletes. - 29951

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