KILIAN JORNET BORN TO RUN - Amer Sports

IN KILIAN’S
FOOTSTEPS
In June Kilian Jornet ran 696 kilometers over the Pyrenees easily and
naturally like a breath of fresh air. He was followed by 22 fans who
were selected from over 1,000 applicants. F George Semler t Salomon
In Andorra’s Pas de la Casa, 22 experienced trail runners,
many of them champions and record-holders,
await the arrival of the 22-year-old Kilian Jornet.
Five days earlier, Kilian had started east across the
696-kilometer Pyrenees mountain range from the Cabo
de Higuer lighthouse on the Atlantic Bay of Biscay. These
were the chosen few, picked from over 1,000 applicants
who responded to a Salomon Running website announcement
asking “Who would like to run with Kilian?”
Finally, after 45 minutes, Kilian appears on the grassy
upper slopes of the ski run. Applause breaks out, and continues.
Kilian, who uncannily resembles the mountain goat
he can almost certainly outrun, looks embarrassed. The
group poses for a photo, with Kilian bashfully taking a
place at the back left. Click. “Okay now, please, with Kilian
in the middle,” pleads the official Salomon photographer.
Everyone laughs and scolds Kilian for being…himself.
After the photo, he takes a swig of water and a couple of
gummy bears, and he’s off again, moving at his usual brisk
though not blistering pace.
“What motivated you to want to run with Kilian,” a journalist
asked 46-year-old Santiago Alvarruiz of Valencia,
Spain. Alvarruiz, a small, light man with an ascetic,
reserved air, seemed stunned by the question. “He’s my
idol. Naturally it is a great honor to run with Kilian. It’s
like a dream come true!”
Wanderer
Three years ago, Alvarruiz had never heard of Kilian Jornet.
Trail runners, sky runners, and ultra-mountain running
enthusiasts around the world discovered Kilian all of
a sudden when he won his first UTMB, the Ultra-Trail
Montblanc race in 2008. Patrick Leick from the advanced
R&D footwear division from Salomon remembers when
Kilian, then only 20, announced that he would run in the
21-hour overnight Montblanc race. “Kilian said he wanted
to run the race, and that he would win it. I was, shall we
say, surprised by his confidence, though Kilian is such a
shy, modest young man; it did not sound like a boast so
much as a simple statement of fact.”
The final 45 kilometers of Kilian’s sixth day on the
trail crossed the Col de Puymorens, curled around the
2,921-meter Pic Carlit still too snowed in to climb over,
and wound down along the lakes of Les Bouillouses before
descending through pine forests to Kilian’s present hometown
of Font Romeu, France. There he is studying Physical
Education at the French National High Performance
Center.
Kilian seems to float through the Pyrenees like a
breath of fresh air, with no one ever sure where he will pop
up next. Joan Solà from Salomon Spain says,“He’s unpredictable.
If he sees something he wants to check out he’ll
run over and have a look. He constantly appears where we
don’t expect him to, usually looking for more elegant
trails, prettier paths, more interesting spots. He doesn’t
run in a straight line; he wanders, eats mountain grasses
and flora, drinks from streams and springs, tastes things
as he moves along. Running around the Lake Tahoe rim he
Twenty-two fans selected for the run and Kilian’s supporters met
the runner in Pas de la Casa.
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