A review of the basics of circular motion: The radius of a merry-go-round is 5 meters, and it takes 12 seconds to go around once. We want to calculate the speed of an atom in the outer rim. First, how far does the atom go in 12 s? (This distance is the circumference of the circle.) distance = 31.41592654 (correct answer) Therefore, what is the speed of the atom? speed = ??? What is the direction of the velocity of this atom? towards the center away from the center or tangential.