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40Race Shoe FinderEst. 2023 · London

Head to head

ASICS Magic Speed 5vs
On Cloudboom Strike

Magic Speed 5

£130

Typical street price · £150 RRP

38mm — road legal
Cloudboom Strike

£175

Typical street price · £270 RRP

39mm — road legal

Choose the Magic Speed 5 if…

  • You want something more forgiving. This is the steadier platform — useful if your form goes late, or if you are on your feet longer.
  • You want a conventional fit rather than a narrow or wide last.
  • Money matters: it is selling around £130 against £175, and the time difference between them is smaller than the price difference suggests.
  • You want more races out of one pair: about 500km of competitive life against 250km.
  • You are racing 10K — built for it, where the Cloudboom Strike is not.

Choose the Cloudboom Strike if…

  • You want the bigger return: 3–4.2% economy gain against 2–3.1%, and that gap widens the longer you are out there.
  • You want the lighter shoe: 195g against 218g, a 23g difference you will feel late in a race.
  • You race off a strong, repeatable stride and want the more aggressive ride rather than the safer one.
  • You have a narrow foot and want to be locked in.

What does this
mean for you?

Every figure below is recalculated from your race and your current time. The gap between two shoes is not fixed — it grows with how long you are on your feet.

Over marathon from 3:45:00

Time back
Magic Speed 5: 83s–158sCloudboom Strike: 152s–233s
Cost per second saved
Magic Speed 5: £0.14Cloudboom Strike: £0.23

Ranges, not promises. Both figures are against a standard trainer, and the honest answer for most runners is that the difference between two shoes of this class is smaller than the difference a month of decent training makes.

Every number.

010203040503831
Magic Speed 5
010203040503933
Cloudboom Strike

What you pay

Street price
Magic Speed 5£130■
Cloudboom Strike£175

What the shoe is actually selling for across the shops we read, not its RRP.

RRP
Magic Speed 5£150
Cloudboom Strike£270

List price. Almost nobody pays it for a race shoe.

Cost per race
Magic Speed 5£16■
Cloudboom Strike£44

Street price divided by the races the foam stays fast for.

Cost per second saved
Magic Speed 5£0.14■
Cloudboom Strike£0.23

The whole-life question: what each second of race time costs you.

What it does

Estimated saving
Magic Speed 583s–158s
Cloudboom Strike152s–233s■

Against a standard trainer, over the distance and time set above.

Economy gain
Magic Speed 52–3.1%
Cloudboom Strike3–4.2%■
Built for
Magic Speed 510K · Half · Marathon
Cloudboom StrikeHalf · Marathon
Best use case
Magic Speed 5The best entry point to carbon. Real plate, real super foam, durable enough to train in, and about half the price of the flagships.
Cloudboom StrikeA genuinely competitive marathon racer and the first On shoe that belongs in this conversation on merit.

How it is built

Weight
Magic Speed 5218 g
Cloudboom Strike195 g■

Manufacturer figure at men's US 9.

Stack (heel)
Magic Speed 538 mm
Cloudboom Strike39 mm
Stack (forefoot)
Magic Speed 531 mm
Cloudboom Strike33 mm
Drop
Magic Speed 57 mm
Cloudboom Strike6 mm
Foam
Magic Speed 5FF Blast Turbo
Cloudboom StrikeHelion HF
Plate
Magic Speed 5carbon fibre
Cloudboom Strikecarbon fibre

Rules and fit

Road legal
Magic Speed 5Yes (38 mm)
Cloudboom StrikeYes (39 mm)

World Athletics caps road racing shoes at 40 mm of stack.

Fit
Magic Speed 5standard
Cloudboom Strikenarrow
Stability
Magic Speed 5stable
Cloudboom Strikebalanced

Neither is better in the abstract — it depends on your stride.

Race life
Magic Speed 5~500 km■
Cloudboom Strike~250 km

How long the foam stays fast, not how long the shoe survives.

Data confidence
Magic Speed 5estimated
Cloudboom Strikeestimated

■ marks the better figure where one is genuinely better. Fit, foam, drop and stability carry no mark — they depend on your foot and your stride, not on which shoe is superior.

In your size.

Where to buy

Your UK size

Best price today — some sizes£119at Startfitness — £31 under RRP

9 retailer checks failed on the last run, so their prices are missing rather than wrong.

Prices are captured when the site is built and stamped with the time of that check. We never rank a retailer by what it pays us; where a link earns a commission it is marked sponsored and the price you pay is unchanged.

Where to buy

Your UK size

Best price today — some sizes£175at Fitstuff — £95 under RRP

9 retailer checks failed on the last run, so their prices are missing rather than wrong.

Prices are captured when the site is built and stamped with the time of that check. We never rank a retailer by what it pays us; where a link earns a commission it is marked sponsored and the price you pay is unchanged.