Do you want to run as fast as you can in your home gym? You’ll want to check the top speed of the treadmill you’re using. There is actually quite a few different top speeds treadmills have. Let’s find out which one is the fastest.
The fastest treadmill that’s commonly available for a home gym is the Precor TRM800 series. It has a top speed of 16 MPH. The average treadmill for a home gym is 10 to 12 MPH while most commercial treadmills go up to 14 MPH. A treadmill with 12 MPH top speed is sufficient for most people.
Let’s dive into the details a little bit more below. Want to consider more than just speed? Click here to find a complete guide on how to select the right treadmill for you.
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The Fastest Home Gym Treadmill
The fastest treadmill you can reasonably get for a home gym (and most commercial gym) is the Precor TRM 800 Series. It has a 4 CHP (8 Peak HP) motor which gives it a 16 MPH (25.5 KM/H) top speed. This is the highest top speed of any commonly available treadmill. This is the highest top speed of any normal treadmill. There are a few exceptions but those aren’t commonly available.
Suggested: How much HP does a treadmill need?
It’s an amazing, high quality, treadmill with all the features you can imagine. It’s also not cheap, you won’t get much change back from $10k.
Let’s go over some of the top features of the Precor TRM800 Series;
- 16 MPH/25.5 KM/H top speed
- Dimensions; 83” x 35” x 62“/ 211 x 89 x 157.5 cm
- Equipment weight; 420 lbs./190 kg
- User weight limit: 400 lbs./181 kg
- Lifetime warranty on frame. 10 year warranty on parts and wear items, 3 years on console.
- 27 pre-programmed workouts
- -3% decline to 15% incline
- 22” wide belt
- Available with different consoles
It’s an all-round great treadmill. You won’t be disappointed.
How Fast Can The Average Treadmill Go?
I’ve already written a post about the average speeds and top speeds of treadmills. Check it out to find a bit more information. Additionally you can find a post here about treadmills with a top speed of over 12 MPH.
The average home gym treadmill has a top speed of 10 to 12 MPH. The average treadmill in a commercial gym has a top speed of 12 to 14 MPH.
The top speed of a treadmill is dictated by a few things;
- Motor power
- Component strength
- Safety margins
Just like in any vehicle, the motor plays a big role in how fast a treadmill can go. In general, more powerful means faster. On a treadmill the motor doesn’t only need the power to spin the belt but also keep the speed constant while you’re running on it. The footfall while running is a continuous impact on the belt. This slows it down slightly. The motor has to have enough headroom to push through that braking action without breaking, overheating, etc.
Suggested: How much does a treadmill motor replacement cost?
Other components also have their speed rating. Rollers, bearings, belts, fasteners, etc, all need to be able to handle the speed and other stresses. The faster a treadmill moves, the more stress on all the components and they have to be able to deal with that.
Of course there are also some safety margins built into that speed. The manufacturer has to give a warranty on the treadmill for a certain amount of time. If the top speed was actually pushing the limit of the capabilities of the components, there would be quite a few failures. That’s not good for the consumer or the manufacturer so limiting the top speed is one of the ways manufacturers limit component wear.
Suggested: Do you need a mat under your treadmill?
How Fast a Treadmill Do You Need?
For the average person, a treadmill that goes up to 12 MPH is fine. This is enough for a challenging run for the majority of people. Especially doing longer sessions. 12 MPH is a 5 minute mile. While that’s not an impossible time, many people can’t actually run that fast for an extended period of time.
Especially if you combine the speed with the incline settings most treadmills have, 12 MPH is very tough to run at for longer than about a minute for most people.
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However, in the end, it really depends on what you’re training for. For weight loss, long duration, steady state cardio exercise is the best option. For most people, this is not done at 12 MPH or higher because that’s just too intensive to keep up for 30 minutes or more.
For cardiovascular benefits, High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT) is a useful tool. Once you become better conditioned, it’s possible to start getting up to that 12 MPH average top speed. However, for interval training, the absolute speed is not all that important. It’s all about intensity. And it’s pretty easy to increase the intensity by adding incline into the mix.
A good interval timer is going to make HIIT workouts much more enjoyable and easier to follow. Check out the GymNext Flex timer. It’s super easy to set up and control contrary to most other interval timers making the set up for any workout a breeze.
So for most people a 12 MPH top speed will be enough although if you’re a good runner, 14 MPH might be more suitable. Of course if you are training for sprints, you want to get a treadmill with a high top speed and one that can change speeds quickly. That means a high top speed and a powerful motor.
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Another benefit is that a treadmill that’s built to have a 16 MPH top speed more headroom at lower speeds. So if you want to regularly work out at 12 MPH, getting the treadmill that can do 14 or 16 MPH is not that crazy.
Think about it like this; would you rather drive 60 MPH in a car that has a top speed of 60 MPH or in a car that can do 120 MPH? The latter would likely be a much better experience. That’s because the engine, suspension, tires, brakes, etc. are all built to do 120 MPH so 60 MPH is no problem. However, the car that can do 60 MPH will be working at its limits at that speed. The same goes for treadmills. Using a treadmill with a less than maximum speed means all the components are not stressed to the limits. This means it’ll be more consistent and more reliable.
There are quite a few parts of a treadmill that require maintenance and can break so having one with stronger components is a good thing if you’re going to use it hard.
However, just like with cars, the ones that go faster are quite a bit more expensive because they require all those stronger components. Getting the best you can afford will give you a better experience but of course it completely depends on your financial situation what you can afford.
Favorite Cardio Accessories
Check out these accessories that improve a home cardio workout:
- Equipment mat: All cardio equipment should be put on an equipment mat. The Rubber-Cal mat (Amazon) is an affordable yet very high-quality choice.
- Interval timer: To time your intervals and workouts, there is no better choice than the GymNext Flex. It’s super easy to use and set up with a phone app.
- Tablet holder: Cardio can be boring. With this tablet holder (Amazon) you can follow along with on-demand workouts or just watch a movie on any cardio machine.
- Heart rate monitor: Monitoring your heart rate is very important while doing cardio. The Polar H10 (Amazon) connects to almost anything you can imagine and is very accurate.
To find which cardio machines I recommend for home gyms, click here.