Sure, there might be a couple of outliers; free-spirited tri hippies who ride 15 year old bikes, who do 6 hour trail runs just to be at one with nature, and who couldn't care less about which brand a race bears, the latest aero helmet technology or power numbers. They're in it for the ride, man.
But the rest of us - even those who royally sucked at maths during our schooldays - quickly obtain an Archimedes-like love and appreciation for numbers within a year or two of picking up this great sport. Whether it's pace, speed, heart rate, distance, power or good old-fashioned time, all these numbers play a part in our daily lives... and recording them becomes something of an obsession.