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40Race Shoe FinderEst. 2023 · London

Head to head

HOKA Rocket X 3vs
On Cloudboom Strike

Rocket X 3

£140

Typical street price · £220 RRP

39mm — road legal
Cloudboom Strike

£175

Typical street price · £270 RRP

39mm — road legal

Choose the Rocket X 3 if…

  • You want a conventional fit rather than a narrow or wide last.
  • Money matters: it is selling around £140 against £175, and the time difference between them is smaller than the price difference suggests.
  • You are racing 10K — built for it, where the Cloudboom Strike is not.

Choose the Cloudboom Strike if…

  • 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
Rocket X 3: 145s–219sCloudboom Strike: 152s–233s
Cost per second saved
Rocket X 3: £0.17Cloudboom 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.

010203040503934
Rocket X 3
010203040503933
Cloudboom Strike

What you pay

Street price
Rocket X 3£140■
Cloudboom Strike£175

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

RRP
Rocket X 3£220
Cloudboom Strike£270

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

Cost per race
Rocket X 3£32■
Cloudboom Strike£44

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

Cost per second saved
Rocket X 3£0.17■
Cloudboom Strike£0.23

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

What it does

Estimated saving
Rocket X 3145s–219s
Cloudboom Strike152s–233s■

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

Economy gain
Rocket X 32.9–4%
Cloudboom Strike3–4.2%■
Built for
Rocket X 310K · Half · Marathon
Cloudboom StrikeHalf · Marathon
Best use case
Rocket X 3HOKA’s legal racer, and much the better shoe for anyone who actually needs to comply with the rules. Balanced and predictable.
Cloudboom StrikeA genuinely competitive marathon racer and the first On shoe that belongs in this conversation on merit.

How it is built

Weight
Rocket X 3200 g
Cloudboom Strike195 g■

Manufacturer figure at men's US 9.

Stack (heel)
Rocket X 339 mm
Cloudboom Strike39 mm
Stack (forefoot)
Rocket X 334 mm
Cloudboom Strike33 mm
Drop
Rocket X 35 mm
Cloudboom Strike6 mm
Foam
Rocket X 3PEBA
Cloudboom StrikeHelion HF
Plate
Rocket X 3carbon fibre
Cloudboom Strikecarbon fibre

Rules and fit

Road legal
Rocket X 3Yes (39 mm)
Cloudboom StrikeYes (39 mm)

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

Fit
Rocket X 3standard
Cloudboom Strikenarrow
Stability
Rocket X 3balanced
Cloudboom Strikebalanced

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

Race life
Rocket X 3~280 km■
Cloudboom Strike~250 km

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

Data confidence
Rocket X 3estimated
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£140at Interval Running — £80 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.