Wings for Life Calculator - 2024

You want to know what pace you have to run to reach your target distance at the Wings for Life Run?

On this page you will find the pace requirements for each kilometer of the Wings For Life Run. For example, if you want to run the marathon distance at the Wings for Life Run, you have to run a time of 3:05 hours, which corresponds to a pace of 4:23 minutes per kilometer.

Wings For Life Run Calculator

Run goal: in km || pace in hh:mm:ss || pace car in min/km

Note: The running time cannot be given exactly to the second, since the km cut is used as the basis for the calculation.

What pace must be run for the marathon at the Wings for Life World Run?

In order to be caught up by the Catcher Car at the earliest after the marathon distance, i.e. after 42.195 kilometers, a pace of 04:23 minutes per kilometer must be run. The Catcher Car reaches the marathon distance after a running time of 3:05 hours.

For the half marathon distance at the Wings for Life Run, a pace of 05:25 minutes per kilometer is necessary (= 1:55 hours for the half marathon). For 10 kilometers, a pace of 07:12 minutes per kilometer is sufficient. It gets very comfortable over the 5 kilometers, where a pace of 10:17 minutes per kilometer must be planned for.

If you want to break the 50 kilometer mark at the Wings for Life World Run, you have to run at a pace of 4:08 minutes per kilometer. For 60 kilometers, it's 3:50 minutes per kilometer. At this point, almost all participants worldwide are out of the race.

If you can run a pace of 4 minutes per kilometer consistently, that will get you to almost 55 kilometers. If you plan to run a pace of 5 minutes per kilometer at the World Run, you will reach more than 27 kilometers. With a 6-minute pace, it's still a respectable 15 kilometers at the world's largest charity run.

Wings For Life Run: Car speed

The speed of the Catcher Car is increased every 30 minutes. If after 4.5 hours (270 minutes) there is still one participant in the race, the speed will be increased again to 34 km/h.

Wings for Life Run - All-Time-Records (km)

Since there were several changes in the Catcher Car's running speed, the record data must be split into time periods. From the premiere in 2014 to 2018, the speed of the Catcher Car was increased a little slower, which allowed longer running distances. Since 2019, distances over 60 kilometers have been very difficult to run. In 2021, there was another adjustment. However, this only becomes relevant for distances of more than 64 running kilometers. Therefore, these changes have little impact on the results. Therefore, record data from 2014 - 2018 and from 2019 are given.

Records until 2018

• Runner (m): Giorgio Calcaterra (Italy) with 88.44 kilometers in Milan in 2016.
• Wheelchair runner: Aron Anderson (Sweden) with 92.14 kilometers in 2017 in Dubai
• Runner (f): Dominika Stelmach (Poland) with 68.21 kilometers in 2018 in Santiago (Chile)

Records from 2019

• Runner (m): Michael Taylor (Great Britain) with 69.92 kilometers in 2020 (Virtual Run)
• Wheelchair runner: Aron Anderson (Sweden) with 68.15 kilometers in 2020 (Virtual Run)
• Runner (f): Nina Zarina (Russia) with 60.16 kilometers in 2021 (Virtual Run)

How does the Wings for Life World Run work?

It is a unique format that Red Bull had salvaged in 2014. In the run, where all the proceeds go to spinal cord research, there is no fixed finish line, but a moving finish line.

Normally, the fastest runner in a race reaches the finish line first, but in the Wings for Life Run, the fastest runner reaches the finish line last. This is because the "Catcher Car" ensures that participants are gradually eliminated from the race.

This car starts only 30 minutes after the starting signal. This gives all participants the opportunity to run out a comfortable lead. Every 30 minutes the chase vehicle increases the speed. At the beginning, the speed is still 14 km/h, but over the course of the next few hours, it increases to over 30 km/h. This means that after about four hours or so, the participants have a comfortable lead. Thus, after about four hours or a little more than 60 kilometers, even the last athletes are caught up by the vehicle. Whoever is the last to be intercepted by the Catcher Car is the winner.

Simultaneous start in many places around the world

A second fact that makes the Wings for Life World Run unique is a parallel start in many places around the world. No matter if in the USA, in Germany or in Australia, everyone starts at the same time. So this results in runners in America starting in the morning, Europeans in the early afternoon and Australians late in the evening.

Participation is possible either at a local race live on site or virtually at any location via Wings for Life Run App. Local races are available in 10 - 15 cities, such as Vienna, Munich, Melbourne, Pretoria, Rio, Sunrise (Florida), Taichung or Zug (Switzerland). Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2020 and 2021 there was only the possibility to participate in the virtual race via the app.

According to the organizers, around 100,000 runners and wheelchair users register for the Wings for Life World Run every year. The entire entry fee is donated to spinal cord research. The entry fee differs depending on the location or country and whether participation is local or virtual. In German-speaking countries, it is around 40 euros per athlete.

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