Originally Posted by
FRAFixtures
The FRA committee together with the governing bodies for fell/hill/mountain running in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales decided to go with "rounded" figures at the time of metrication - the definitions of Cat. A, B and C races are incorporated into both FRA and UKA rules.
You ask why not use a direct conversion of 250ft/mile to the metric equivalent ie 47.5m/km. The new metric rules are expected to be in use for many years to come. An organiser of a new race at some future date could equally well think it strange to have an unmemorable requirement of 47.5m/km!
We then had to decide whether to "round up" or "round down". In the case of Cat. A races, in particular, it was felt more appropriate to raise the bar than to lower it. Hence a relatively small proportion of races have changed category this year.