Quote Originally Posted by Aggie_Ama View Post
Ohhh that sounds like an amazing race! I found my niche is longer races, it is mental and physical. You can't just be the best athlete, you have to be mentally conditioned. I cannot wait to hear about your event!
Exactly. I am not naturally gifted when it comes to power or speed. I am however naturally very good at pacing myself and hanging out in that long endurance zone for a really long time. The longer the race is, the better I place usually. And I always end up passing people in the last 1/4 of a race.

The mental part is to my advantage as well. I seem to usually be able to put my brain in a different place where the hurt isn't such an issue and I can do it for hours at a time. I'm also really good at minimizing time off the bike, I think that comes from training for fast transitions in triathlon. While other people hang out in aid stations, get off the bike, stretch etc. I get what I need and get out. You can easily make up 5 to 10 min on a competitor that way.

The big question is recovery. Can I do long days like that for 9 days straight? This is an aspect of my physiology that I haven't explored yet. It's what I plan to test in the coming months. This race is super expensive so I don't want to enter unless I'm fairly confident that I have the capacity to finish. Things can always happen that mess up your race, but I want to go into it knowing it's possible.