In early June of this yr, Anthony Fagundes opened his e 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, stated 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
Just a few weeks earlier than, a number of pals had despatched him the Instagram submit promoting that Kilian Jornetone 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 Loss of life 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 little bit bit, however not in a foul approach,” stated 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 truly received picked. That is wild. I don’t know the way to the 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, after all, 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 chargeable for working 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 tremendous, so I took it with a grain of salt,” Fagundes stated simply over 12 hours earlier than the race was to start, “and I’m slowly beginning to imagine them.”
Working 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 quicker than his profitable time in 2011.
“I’m undecided if Kilian might have run a greater race,” Fagundes stated, after we talked exterior of the awards tent on the Placer Excessive Faculty monitor in Auburn on Sunday after the race, the place the race had completed the evening earlier than, the aid in his voice palpable. Once they began working collectively, Jornet was locked in a decent battle with eventual fourth-place finisher, Jeff Mogaveroand pursuing second-place finisher, Chris Myers. “He regarded actually within the zone,” Fagundes stated 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 School, 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 recognized them for 10-plus years now,” Fagundes stated, “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 working: the California Gold Rush, railroads, the importance of the American River, the 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 in the course of the race, although, Jornet led the dialog. “Kilian doesn’t want me to inform him the way to run the race,” Fagundes stated. “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 concerning the location of the subsequent 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 file.
It was by means of these conversations that Fagundes acknowledged one thing each easy and reassuring: For all of his otherworldly accomplishments, Jornet was a standard man who simply loves working. In actual fact, 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 stated 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 that you must do.”
When he and Jornet crossed No Fingers Bridge, with lower than 4 miles to go, Fagundes felt the tempo get quicker. Oh, right here it comeshe thought. Fagundes stayed with him. “It was a blast,” was his post-race abstract.
Fagundes was completely satisfied 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 chargeable for carrying it to the end till an support station volunteer informed Fagundes as he was on the point of run the ultimate mile.
“And so I come again and seize it,” Fagundes stated. “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, You recognize what? I’ll simply cruise it in from right here. I did my job.”
Jornet, searching for 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 equipment),’” Fagundes remembered. “And he’s like, ‘I’m sorry that you simply had to try this.’”
A Full-Circle Second
Fagundes, smiling for almost the whole lot 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 received to run it with him. “It’s a really full-circle second,” he stated, noting that Jornet’s win got here as he was nonetheless in his monitor and cross-country working period and simply interested in 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 working throughout No Fingers Bridge in the course of the 2025 Western States 100. Photograph: iRunFar/Grace Lattyak
