Mondo Knows Facts

A cheetah can accelerate faster than many sports cars

A cheetah can reach 60 miles per hour from rest in about three seconds.

With flexible spines, non-retractable claws that act like athletic cleats, and large nasal passages for rapid oxygen intake, cheetahs are built for extreme speed. However, their high-speed sprints consume so much energy that they can only last a few hundred metres.

Cheetah portrait side
Bilby ยท CC BY 3.0 ยท licence ยท source

Where this comes from

San Diego Zoo

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Tags: cheetah, speed, predator

A cheetah can accelerate faster than many sports cars: the short answers

Where does this come from, and can I check it?
A cheetah can reach 60 miles per hour from rest in about three seconds. The figure is taken from San Diego Zoo, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
Is this really a animals fact?
Yes. It sits on the Animals shelf, one of 1,090 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
What else can I read about it?
The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.