Application of contextual knowledge is key to a successful outcome.
Just because I can cycle 100 miles in a day in the UK in training, without contextual information about the current location and conditions, it would not have been possible to ride 100 miles day after day on this Raid. Local intelligence was expertly provided by our tour guides: where to stop for lunch for a filling, cycle appropriate meal that was made for us quickly; stop to collect lunch at this bakery as there is nothing for the next 30 miles; long descent – get your layers on; long climb coming – get those extra layers off again.
A generic plan or template solution may not work and will certainly not be optimal; tailoring is needed to meet the conditions and the context.
Play to your strengths; acknowledge your weaknesses and work around them.
In our “groupetto", some of us were faster on the climbs, some on the descents. We started the Raid by waiting for each other at the top of the climb and the bottom of the descent but we found that this impacted our goal – we were finishing the day very late 😴. We worked out it was better for the climbers to begin their descents and get caught up.
We allowed ourselves to focus on our strengths and work around our relative weaknesses while still meeting up at pre-agreed points for the requisite (good-natured) banter.
