A system for, method of and computer program product captures performance-characteristic data from the execution of a program and models system performance based on that data. Performance-characterization data based on easily captured reuse distance metrics is targeted, defined as the total number of memory references between two accesses to the same piece of data. Methods for efficiently capturing this kind of metrics are described. These data can be refined into easily interpreted performance metrics, such as performance data related to caches with LRU replacement and random replacement strategies in combination with fully associative as well as limited associativity cache organizations. Methods for assessing cache utilization as well as parallel execution are covered.