Kilian's Quest

Spaniard Kilian Jornet demolished the speed record on the Tahoe Rim Trail, a 165-mile route. Though the talented runner beat the the previous record by over seven hours, he made sure to enjoy the scenery en route.

October 1, 2009

Twenty-one-year-old Kilian Jornet relaxed in Tahoe City, CA on Wednesday afternoon, September 30. He should have been relaxing. The Spanish trail runner had just run the entire 165-mile Tahoe Rim Trail that circumnavigates Lake Tahoe in 38 hours and 32 minutes, finishing at 7:30 p.m. the night before. In the process, Jornet had shattered the previous speed record on the trail (set in 1995 by Western States legend Tim Tweitmeyer) by an astonishing seven and a half hours.

This kid is fast.

Growing up in the Pyrenees with a mountain guide for a father and a ski mountaineer/sky runner as mom, the soft-spoken Catalan started climbing mountains at an early age, summitting his first 3,000-meter peak at age four.

He soon followed the footsteps of his parents and entered ski mountaineering races and mountain running races, seeing success in competition running all through his teens.

So, it shouldn't have come as a huge surprise when, in 2008, a 20-year-old Jornet won the 103-mile—and very competitive—Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc. He repeated the win this past August.

This season, he began taking on speed records, starting something dubbed "Kilian's Quest" by his sponsor, Salomon. Without a race environment or competitors to push him, these speed records require much planning and dedication. Each one is a race against time. The quest kicked off with a speed record attempt of Corisca's 120-mile GR-20 route—a technical and mountainous trail that traverses the island in the Mediterranean Sea. Jornet demolished the record.

And then came Tahoe.

On his first trip to the United States, Jornet says that he thinks the geography is very diverse, and the people are very open-minded and friendly. During his Rim Trail attempt, he got to know a few Americans up close, as seven pacers split duties over two days.

"He's the nicest guy," says pacer Adam Chase. "He'd never ask for his water bottle, but when you gave it to him, like every 10 minutes for six or seven hours, he'd always say, 'Thank you.'"

"And he just dances over rocks. He's so delicate, and he keeps almost the same pace going uphill or down," says Chase.

When asked how he was feeling just 20 hours after he completed the 38+ hour effort (his longest run so far), Jornet says that he feels good, but that the run was very hard. "A lot of other runs I do, like Corsica, and in the mountains ... I am not all the time running. There is a lot of walking, and times where you use your hands because it's so technical. This was the same movements for the whole time." And he admits, "The last six or seven hours, from Echo Lake to Barker Pass, were very difficult."