Erin Wallace rounded the 600-metre mark on the back stretch in Xiamen, China, holding on for dear life. In her periphery, she eyed the blinking blue light at her feet that was attempting to leave her behind.
Erin was one of two runners who were pacing world champion Faith Kipyegon for the 1,000 metres in April's Diamond League meet. Pacers, or rabbits, ensure that at least one runner in the field keeps the right pace to break a certain time, usually a record. In this case, Faith was looking to break 2:28.98 in the 1,000 metres, a world record that's stood for 27 years.
Erin is familiar with laying down a pinpoint pace. In London in 2024, the 24-year-old Scottish athlete paced the 800 metres for fellow national team runner and Nike athlete Keely Hodgkinson. Peeling off the track after 500 metres, she watched Keely soar around the second lap and break the British national record with a time of 1:54.61.
Physically, pacing and racing are interrelated. But mentally, they do have their differences.
Pacing exists at the centre of two priorities: racing on behalf of someone else, while competing against your own physical capacity.
"Just because you can run a fast time doesn't necessarily mean you can regulate your speed for someone else's time".
Erin Wallace, Nike athlete and professional pacer
At the gun
An in-between middle distance like the 1,000 metres in Xiamen shows the skilful precision behind every good pacer. Erin's coach, Trevor Painter, suggested she start the race conservatively. The gun sounds; the race begins. In starting as the third runner from the furthest outside lane, she needed to pull ahead of the pack for the first 50 metres. But at the 200-metre mark, she ran 29.4, a shade over the race pace of 28.8. She needed to pick things up. Fast enough? Too fast? Too slow? The internal dialogue rages in a pacer's mind. By the time she rounded the first 400 metres, she clocked a 59.38, nearly even with the blinking light around the track's interior—a light acting as a digital rabbit.
"In Diamond League meets, you have clocks stationed at every 100-metre mark. But you still need to have an internal physical sense of when to pick things up", says Erin. "Just because you can run a fast time doesn't necessarily mean you can regulate your speed for someone else's time".
During the race
There's a time on the clock, and there's the clock ticking away in your body, raising the alarm to slow down or speed up. Erin mentions how pacing at different distances can require various levels of awareness. At shorter distances, you're going at a sprint, relying more on the light. Your athletic threshold is the barometer. A longer distance, however, can leave more room for strategic error.
"You learn to notice both your body and your environment at a high intensity when you're a pacer", says Erin. "You notice your position relative to the field. You notice where the timers are placed in the stadium. You especially notice anything that can disrupt the race, like how your exit impacts the other runners".
Going for the exit
The final 400 metres, where many pacers will exit as the other runners take the bell lap, can be loaded with potential tripping hazards: the inside rail, the clock, electronic scoreboard equipment. In Erin's case during the Xiamen race, she looked down the last 20 metres of the 600-metre home stretch and realised that things were "looking a little busy down there", referring to a banner advertisement on the ground preventing an easy exit. She'd need to either hurdle it or find an opening about 2 metres past the finishing line and quickly veer off.
She managed to find a gap in front of the banner. She shot for the exit and made it—barely.
"When you peel off the track", she says, "you want the runner following you to have every detail lined up for them".
That was true for Faith, who handily won the 1,000 metres, though narrowly missed beating the world record. She'll take those learnings to her next challenge: attempting to break the 4-minute mile in Paris on 26 June.
Erin's perspective on Faith's daring: "It's crazy", she says. "When you're running up close with her, like I have this season, you're able to appreciate just how talented she is". Erin adds that she's honoured to play a part in the Breaking4 arc. "Pacing gives you a chance to be part of another runner's story", she says. "Knowing that I can play a role in her path to beat that time is inspiring".