[stevew]

Generally, the server used will be the closest one (geographically) to your ISP location - from a wired connection. That's the way those sites work. 1st hop would normally be the closest to your network, which would be closest to your ISP. I have seen this forever on wired networks. If I go through say our VPN tunnel, which uses Fibre Noire (Fiber), their NOC will be the 1st hop, since they also happen to host one of the test sites for speedtest.net. If I go through my DSL connection, which is hosted in Ontario, the 1st hope will be right around them, and I'm in Quebec, but my IP block is assigned to the ISP in Toronto. If I go through my cable connection (Montreal based), it will hit a server in Montreal, which is where I'm closest to.

Ping latency is bullshit, since they're generally pinging only one NOC, the one closest to the IP block you fall under.