Select the most appropriate option to fill in the blank.

During the night the express train picked up ______.

speed

The correct option to fill in the blank is speed.

The sentence is about an express train that picked up speed during the night. This means that the train was moving faster than it was before. The other options are not as appropriate.

• Distance does not make sense because the train was already moving, so it did not pick up distance.
• Quick does not make sense because it is an adjective, not a noun.
• Rate does not make sense because it is a measure of speed, not speed itself.