The 10 Songs That Correlate With the Fastest Running Pace
I analyzed 123,000 song plays across 10,000 runs. Here's what I found.
The 10 songs that correlate with the fastest running pace, based on 123,326 Spotify song plays from 1,442 runners
I analyzed 123,326 song plays across 10,549 runs from 1,442 runners to find which songs correlate with the fastest pace. Here are the top 10.
TrackTunes syncs your Strava activities with your Spotify listening history, calculating your pace during each song. To find these songs, I filtered for tracks played by at least 25 different runners and ranked them by average pace.
Each song below shows a box plot of pace distribution. The red line is the median — watch it shift right (faster) as you scroll down.
Let's count down from #10 to #1:
Beauty And A Beat
Justin Bieber
26 runners · Listen on Spotify
Starburster
Fontaines D.C.
27 runners · Listen on Spotify
Just The Way You Are
Milky
39 runners · Listen on Spotify
Take Me Out
Franz Ferdinand
39 runners · Listen on Spotify
Nice To Each Other
Olivia Dean
26 runners · Listen on Spotify
Heads Will Roll - A-Trak Remix
Yeah Yeah Yeahs
25 runners · Listen on Spotify
What Do These Songs Have in Common?
Not much, honestly! lol. The genres span nu-metal (Linkin Park), electronic (Daft Punk, John Summit), indie rock (Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Franz Ferdinand, Fontaines D.C.), orchestral (Woodkid), pop (Justin Bieber, Olivia Dean, Milky). BPMs range widely.
The common thread isn't tempo or genre. It's something harder to quantify — energy, familiarity, and maybe just ✨vibes✨. Listen to whatever makes you feel good — I truly think that's what actually matters.
Now, just a quick disclaimer for the internet data purists: causation does not equal correlation. Does blasting Linkin Park magically shave 20 seconds off your mile? uh, no dude. It's definitely simply more likely that the faster runners just happen to have a fond taste in early-2000s nu-metal.
The Real Conclusion? Group Data is Pointless.
If there's one thing I really believe after looking at this data, it's that averages don't matter. Justin Bieber might get 26 random runners down to a 9:45 pace, but it might completely ruin your cadence and drop you to an 11-minute mile.
Performance music has a huge psychological component and is hyper-individual, just like our tastes in all kinds of art. A song that gives one person a massive dopamine hit may well do absolutely nothing for you.
Which means the only dataset that actually matters... is your own. Happy running!
- Dave
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Stop running to other people's playlists. Connect your accounts, log a few runs, and let your data tell the story of your miles.
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