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40Race Shoe FinderEst. 2023 · London

Head to head

On Cloudboom Strikevs
PUMA Deviate Nitro Elite 3

Cloudboom Strike

£175

Typical street price · £270 RRP

39mm — road legal
Deviate Nitro Elite 3

£109

Typical street price · £200 RRP

38mm — road legal

Choose the Cloudboom Strike if…

  • You have a narrow foot and want to be locked in.

Choose the Deviate Nitro Elite 3 if…

  • You want the lighter shoe: 175g against 195g, a 20g difference you will feel late in a race.
  • You want a conventional fit rather than a narrow or wide last.
  • Money matters: it is selling around £109 against £175, and the time difference between them is smaller than the price difference suggests.
  • You want more races out of one pair: about 300km of competitive life against 250km.
  • You are racing 5K or 10K — built for it, where the Cloudboom Strike is not.

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
Cloudboom Strike: 152s–233sDeviate Nitro Elite 3: 145s–219s
Cost per second saved
Cloudboom Strike: £0.23Deviate Nitro Elite 3: £0.13

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.

010203040503933
Cloudboom Strike
010203040503830
Deviate Nitro Elite 3

What you pay

Street price
Cloudboom Strike£175
Deviate Nitro Elite 3£109■

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

RRP
Cloudboom Strike£270
Deviate Nitro Elite 3£200

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

Cost per race
Cloudboom Strike£44
Deviate Nitro Elite 3£23■

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

Cost per second saved
Cloudboom Strike£0.23
Deviate Nitro Elite 3£0.13■

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

What it does

Estimated saving
Cloudboom Strike152s–233s■
Deviate Nitro Elite 3145s–219s

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

Economy gain
Cloudboom Strike3–4.2%■
Deviate Nitro Elite 32.9–4%
Built for
Cloudboom StrikeHalf · Marathon
Deviate Nitro Elite 35K · 10K · Half · Marathon
Best use case
Cloudboom StrikeA genuinely competitive marathon racer and the first On shoe that belongs in this conversation on merit.
Deviate Nitro Elite 3The sane sibling to the Fast-R. Light, versatile, considerably cheaper, and easily the most underrated racer here.

How it is built

Weight
Cloudboom Strike195 g
Deviate Nitro Elite 3175 g■

Manufacturer figure at men's US 9.

Stack (heel)
Cloudboom Strike39 mm
Deviate Nitro Elite 338 mm
Stack (forefoot)
Cloudboom Strike33 mm
Deviate Nitro Elite 330 mm
Drop
Cloudboom Strike6 mm
Deviate Nitro Elite 38 mm
Foam
Cloudboom StrikeHelion HF
Deviate Nitro Elite 3NITROFOAM Elite
Plate
Cloudboom Strikecarbon fibre
Deviate Nitro Elite 3carbon fibre

Rules and fit

Road legal
Cloudboom StrikeYes (39 mm)
Deviate Nitro Elite 3Yes (38 mm)

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

Fit
Cloudboom Strikenarrow
Deviate Nitro Elite 3standard
Stability
Cloudboom Strikebalanced
Deviate Nitro Elite 3balanced

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

Race life
Cloudboom Strike~250 km
Deviate Nitro Elite 3~300 km■

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

Data confidence
Cloudboom Strikeestimated
Deviate Nitro Elite 3estimated

■ 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£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.

Where to buy

Your UK size

Best price today — some sizes£109at Startfitness — £91 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.