In early June of this yr, Anthony Fagundes opened his electronic mail after a run and noticed the topic line.
“You’ve been chosen,” the preview learn.
He was excited: He had been coming into a number of Strava challenges and was able to lastly declare his prize.
“Then I opened it,” Fagundes, a 35-year-old ultrarunner from the Sacramento, California, space, mentioned throughout an interview on the Friday earlier than this yr’s Western States 100. “And I noticed it, ‘Congratulations, you’ve been chosen as Kilian’s pacer.’ And I used to be like, Holy crap.”
A Uncommon Alternative
A couple of weeks earlier than, a number of pals had despatched him the Instagram put up promoting that Kilian Jornet, one of many biggest off-road runners of all time, was in search of a pacer for his return to Western States. After answering a few questions and submitting his two greatest race outcomes — a sixth-place end on the Canyons 100k in 2022 and a win at this yr’s Georgia Dying Race — Fagundes waited as his pals pestered him for an replace.
On June 10, the information got here: From a pool of over 1,000 candidates, Fagundes had been chosen to tempo Jornet, who was returning to run the Western States 100 for the primary time since his victory 14 years in the past.
“It was a sinking feeling a bit of bit, however not in a foul method,” mentioned Fagundes, who has been part of the race yearly since 2009, both as a spectator or pacer for his pals. “It was identical to, Oh my gosh: I really obtained picked. That is wild. I don’t know the right way to the right way to actually really feel proper now.”
Anthony Fagundes pacing Kilian Jornet to a third-place end on the 2025 Western States 100. Photograph: iRunFar/Eszter Horanyi
There was pleasure, in fact, but in addition shock and no small quantity of disquiet. The gravity of the duty earlier than him slowly sunk in: He was going to be liable for operating the ultimate 20 miles of the enduring race with Jornet, who has been one of many biggest athletes within the sport for almost 20 years and whose health main as much as Western States had been well-chronicled. It was each a dream alternative and a terrifying proposition.
“Everyone says I ought to be wonderful, so I took it with a grain of salt,” Fagundes mentioned simply over 12 hours earlier than the race was to start, “and I’m slowly beginning to imagine them.”
Operating with Kilian Jornet
He was proper to. On Saturday, June 28, within the searing dry warmth of California, Fagundes picked up Jornet on the Inexperienced Gate support station at mile 80 and helped tempo him to a third-place end in 14:19:22, properly greater than an hour sooner than his profitable time in 2011.
“I’m undecided if Kilian might have run a greater race,” Fagundes mentioned, after we talked exterior of the awards tent on the Placer Excessive Faculty observe in Auburn on Sunday after the race, the place the race had completed the evening earlier than, the aid in his voice palpable. After they began operating collectively, Jornet was locked in a decent battle with eventual fourth-place finisher, Jeff Mogavero, and pursuing second-place finisher, Chris Myers. “He seemed actually within the zone,” Fagundes mentioned of Jornet. “The tempo stayed just about constant. I felt like we had been slowly chipping away, however there was no panic in any respect.”
Earlier than transitioning to a four-year college, Fagundes attended American River Faculty, a group faculty in Sacramento that coincidentally produced the pacers for all three male podium finishers at this yr’s race: Fagundes for Jornet in third, Gus Gibbs for Myers in second, and Anthony Costales for Caleb Olson in first. “I’ve identified them for 10-plus years now,” Fagundes mentioned, “and we’re all out right here pacing the rostrum yesterday.”
Throughout a get-to-know-you run on the Monday earlier than the race, when Jornet and Fagundes lined the ultimate 10 miles of the race, they talked about every thing however operating: the California Gold Rush, railroads, the importance of the American River, the right way to keep away from poison oak on the course. Fagundes, whose love for this course and space is unmistakable, was each Jornet’s tour information and pacer.
When he ran with him through the race, although, Jornet led the dialog. “Kilian doesn’t want me to inform him the right way to run the race,” Fagundes mentioned. “He is aware of what he’s doing. I’m simply right here for ethical assist and simply to have somebody there.” There have been a pair instances when Jornet requested in regards to the location of the following support station, and Fagundes felt helpful when he might inform him. Maybe their most in-depth dialog was about Caleb Olson’s try to interrupt the course report.
It was by way of these conversations that Fagundes acknowledged one thing each easy and reassuring: For all of his otherworldly accomplishments, Jornet was a traditional man who simply loves operating. In reality, Fagundes used the phrase “regular” to explain him 4 instances throughout our interviews, maybe a becoming time period given Jornet’s sponsor, the model NNormal, which he helped discovered a couple of years in the past.
“He’s only a common man who I’m pacing,” Fagundes mentioned of his mindset, conscious of Jornet’s greatness however attempting to stay unintimidated by it. “Within the second, I’m right here to do what it’s essential do.”
When he and Jornet crossed No Arms Bridge, with lower than 4 miles to go, Fagundes felt the tempo get sooner. Oh, right here it comes, he thought. Fagundes stayed with him. “It was a blast,” was his post-race abstract.
Fagundes was blissful he was capable of sustain. Photograph courtesy of Anthony Fagundes.
Maybe the one remorse from the expertise was that he didn’t get to run with Jornet to the end. Jornet dropped all of his additional gear off at Robie Level, the ultimate support station at mile 99, and each males had been unaware that the pacer was liable for carrying it to the end till an support station volunteer instructed Fagundes as he was on the brink of run the ultimate mile.
“And so I come again and seize it,” Fagundes mentioned. “So, I’m carrying all my bottles and his bottles and all these things in each palms, and I flip round and he’s like 100 yards up the hill, and I’m like, I’m not catching him with all these things proper now. He’s on this zone to go and attempt to catch second if potential. And I used to be like, what? I’ll simply cruise it in from right here. I did my job.”
Jornet, in search of his pacer post-race, apologized. “He’s like, ‘I used to be gonna’ simply come again later that evening to return get [the bottles and gear],’” Fagundes remembered. “And he’s like, ‘I’m sorry that you just had to do this.’”
A Full-Circle Second
Fagundes, smiling for almost the whole thing of our post-race chat, didn’t appear to thoughts. In 2011, he was a 21-year-old watching Jornet win Western States close to the start of his historic profession. Fourteen years later, he obtained to run it with him. “It’s a really full-circle second,” he mentioned, noting that Jornet’s win got here as he was nonetheless in his observe and cross-country operating period and simply inquisitive about ultras. “By no means in my wildest creativeness would I be right here, 14 years later, pacing the man who I watched win in 2011.”
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Kilian Jornet and pacer Anthony Fagundes operating throughout No Arms Bridge through the 2025 Western States 100. Photograph: iRunFar/Grace Lattyak
