diff --git a/cluster/gce/windows/configure.ps1 b/cluster/gce/windows/configure.ps1
index 0235cb9c618..402316b50f6 100644
--- a/cluster/gce/windows/configure.ps1
+++ b/cluster/gce/windows/configure.ps1
@@ -116,6 +116,7 @@ try {
 
   Create-DockerRegistryKey
   Configure-Dockerd
+  Pull-InfraContainer
   DownloadAndInstall-KubernetesBinaries
   Create-NodePki
   Create-KubeletKubeconfig
diff --git a/cluster/gce/windows/k8s-node-setup.psm1 b/cluster/gce/windows/k8s-node-setup.psm1
index b866f71cfc9..9c7dc1c94d7 100644
--- a/cluster/gce/windows/k8s-node-setup.psm1
+++ b/cluster/gce/windows/k8s-node-setup.psm1
@@ -51,7 +51,7 @@
 #  - Document functions using proper syntax:
 #    https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh847834(v=wps.620).aspx
 
-$INFRA_CONTAINER = "e2eteam/pause:3.1"
+$INFRA_CONTAINER = 'mcr.microsoft.com/k8s/core/pause:1.0.0'
 $GCE_METADATA_SERVER = "169.254.169.254"
 # The "management" interface is used by the kubelet and by Windows pods to talk
 # to the rest of the Kubernetes cluster *without NAT*. This interface does not
@@ -1038,6 +1038,23 @@ function Verify-WorkerServices {
   Log_Todo "run more verification commands."
 }
 
+# Pulls the infra/pause container image onto the node so that it will be
+# immediately available when the kubelet tries to run pods.
+# TODO(pjh): downloading the container container image may take a few minutes;
+# figure out how to run this in the background while perform the rest of the
+# node startup steps!
+function Pull-InfraContainer {
+  $name, $label = $INFRA_CONTAINER -split ':',2
+  if (-not ("$(& docker image list)" -match "$name.*$label")) {
+    & docker pull $INFRA_CONTAINER
+    if (!$?) {
+      throw "Error running 'docker pull $INFRA_CONTAINER'"
+    }
+  }
+  $inspect = "$(& docker inspect $INFRA_CONTAINER | Out-String)"
+  Log-Output "Infra/pause container:`n$inspect"
+}
+
 # Add a registry key for docker in EventLog so that log messages are mapped
 # correctly. This is a workaround since the key is missing in the base image.
 # https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/Virtualization-Documentation/pull/503