The PACER Test Script, Explained
What the narration tells you to do, who recorded it, and how a set of gym-class instructions ended up as a copypasta.
Practice with the free beep test →What the Script Tells You to Do
Strip away the voice everyone imitates and the PACER narration is a set of instructions for a shuttle run. Here they all are, in order and paraphrased rather than reprinted, for reasons covered below.
- 1
It introduces itself
The opening names the test and warns you it gets harder as it goes. Nothing for you to do yet. This is the part everyone can recite.
- 2
It counts you in
A short countdown, then an instruction to line up at the start. Stand on the line, not behind it, and face the far end.
- 3
It tells you where to run
Two lines, 20 meters apart. You run from one to the other and you have to be there before the beep. Early is fine. Late is a miss.
- 4
One beep means one lap
Every beep marks the end of a lap. Touch the line, turn, and set off again on that same beep. Arriving early means waiting on the line, not running straight back.
- 5
A second sound means the speed went up
Roughly once a minute the recording plays a different signal and announces a new level, which is your cue that the gap between beeps has shrunk. Level 1 is a jog. By double digits you are close to sprinting between turns.
- 6
It tells you what to do when you miss
If the beep catches you short, keep going to the line, turn, and try to get back on pace. One miss does not end your test.
- 7
It tells you when you are done
A second miss ends it, and you are scored on laps finished rather than a time or a distance. Schools differ on whether those misses have to be back to back, so ask your teacher which version they count.
One line of the original is worth quoting, because it is the line people mean when they say they remember the script. The recording describes itself as a test that “progressively gets more difficult as it continues” (The Cooper Institute, FitnessGram PACER test recording). That is an accurate description and also, if you were fourteen and standing on a gym line, a mild threat.
Why This Page Doesn't Reprint the Whole Thing
The PACER recording and the words in it are The Cooper Institute's work. Plenty of pages have pasted the full text anyway, and that is their risk to run. We would rather explain it and send you to the source, which is free. FitnessGram's own PACER page hosts the original audio as a download, along with the test setup instructions and the six 2020 remixes. If you want to hear the narration, hear it from them.
Who Voiced It, and Who Wrote It
The voice is Roger Francisco. The Cooper Institute named him in its announcement of the remix album, released alongside a short documentary made by students at the Beacon School in New York. Its title says how long the question went unanswered: Line Up At the Start: The Search For the Voice of the FitnessGram.
Francisco told a high school newspaper in 2020 that he recorded the track in Champaign, Illinois, in 1982. That interview is the only place we found a recording date, so treat it as his account rather than a documented fact.
Who wrote the words is a different question, and we could not answer it. No writing credit appears on FitnessGram's site, in the Cooper Institute's press material, or in Francisco's interviews.
Who Made the Test Itself
The running test came first, and it did not start in America. Canadian physiologist Luc Léger and colleagues built the 20-meter shuttle run and published the one-minute-stage version schools still use in the Journal of Sports Sciences in 1988. Outside the US it is usually called the beep test or the multistage fitness test.
The Cooper Institute, founded by Dr Kenneth H. Cooper in 1970 and now part of the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, adapted it for American schools as the aerobic item in FitnessGram, which dates its own start to 1982. The PACER name, the lap-count scoring and that narration are the American layer on top, along with a slower opening minute and a 21st level. The running underneath is Léger's. Our PACER test guide covers how the two line up.
How a Set of Gym Instructions Became a Meme
Millions of American teenagers sat through the same recording in the same gym, which makes it a shared reference sitting around waiting for a platform. In 2016 it got one. Dates below come from Know Your Meme's entry, which tracked the early Vines as they spread.
Early January 2016
An iFunny user posted a Vine dubbing the PACER audio over a clip from the mobile game Boom Beach. It is the earliest instance Know Your Meme has dated.
January 24, 2016
A Vine set the audio over footage of a bus crash and picked up more than 40,000 loops in three months.
January 27, 2016
A Redditor posted a transcript of the introduction to r/copypasta. That is when the audio became text you could paste anywhere, which is why people still search for the words rather than the recording.
February 17, 2016
Eminem's rap battle from 8 Mile, overdubbed. About 26,000 loops in two months.
April 1, 2016
A Hunger Games clip ran to roughly 7.3 million loops in a fortnight. Within days the jokes had moved on to babies' first words and deathbed speeches.
June 22, 2020
The Cooper Institute leaned into it, releasing six official PACER remixes made with Hip Hop Public Health, in English and Spanish, alongside the documentary about its original narrator.
The r/copypasta post is the reason this page exists. Once the audio existed as text you could drop into a group chat, searches for the lyrics and the words took on a life of their own, and they have outlived Vine by a decade.
No, It Wasn't Banned
A screenshot claiming the PACER test was banned from schools for child cruelty has been going round since 2016. It came from a satirical site writing about a country that does not exist. Lead Stories checked it in 2022 and found no evidence of a ban. Schools still run the test, and the recording still opens the same way.
If You're Here Because It's Coming Up
On the day, the pace matters more than the script. What catches most people out is the first two minutes: the early levels feel so slow that everyone sprints them, turns too hard, and has nothing left by level 5. Jog it, and aim to reach the line just before the beep rather than five seconds early.
You can run a 20-meter shuttle test free in your browser on the beep test app, with a lap counter that matches how PACER is scored. If you would rather have the beeps on your phone at the track, take the practice audio instead. No signup, and no narration over the top.
The levels chart has the speed each level asks for, PACER scores by age has the lap counts that land in the healthy range for your age group, and the world record page has the other end of the scale.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does the PACER test script actually say?
It introduces the test, then gives the rules: line up at the start, run 20 meters and reach the line before the beep, one beep per lap, a separate signal each time the speed steps up, keep running to the line if you miss, and stop on your second miss. Your score is your lap count.
Why not just print the whole script here?
The recording and its wording belong to The Cooper Institute, so copying it out wholesale is their call, not ours. The paraphrase above covers everything the narration asks you to do, and the official audio is free on fitnessgram.net.
Who is the voice of the FitnessGram PACER test?
Roger Francisco. The Cooper Institute credits him as the original voice, and New York high school students made a documentary about finding him, released in 2020. Francisco has said he recorded the track in Champaign, Illinois, in 1982. Who wrote the wording he read is not publicly documented.
When did the PACER test become a meme?
January 2016, on Vine. People dubbed the audio over unrelated footage, and a transcript hit r/copypasta on January 27 that year. By April a Hunger Games edit had passed 7 million loops.
Was the PACER test banned for child cruelty?
No. That story traces back to a satirical article from 2016 about a country that does not exist, and Lead Stories found no evidence of any ban when it checked in 2022. Schools across the US still run the test.
Where can I get the official PACER audio?
FitnessGram hosts the original recording and the 2020 remixes for free on fitnessgram.net, and the remixes are on Spotify, Apple Music and YouTube. If you only want beeps to practice against, our own 20m shuttle audio does that job without the narration.
Sources
- The PACER Test and About FitnessGram. Test setup, official audio, remixes, and FitnessGram's 1982 start date.
- New FitnessGram PACER Test Remixes!. The Cooper Institute, August 2020. Credits Roger Francisco as the original voice; covers the remixes and the Beacon School documentary.
- The FitnessGram Man. Hall Record, June 4, 2020. Interview with Francisco; the 1982 Champaign date comes from him.
- The FitnessGram Pacer Test. Know Your Meme. Every date and loop count in the timeline.
- Léger, Mercier, Gadoury & Lambert, “The multistage 20 metre shuttle run test for aerobic fitness”. Journal of Sports Sciences 6(2), 93-101, 1988.
- Fact Check: No Evidence The Pacer Test Has Been Banned For Child Cruelty. Lead Stories, April 11, 2022.
PACER® and FitnessGram® are registered trademarks of The Cooper Institute. beeptest.net is an independent site and is not affiliated with or endorsed by The Cooper Institute.
By Tim · Last updated September 18, 2026