Alanis Siffert admitted she surprised even herself with her Challenge Roth victory – especially a huge PB in the marathon.

Last year the Swiss athlete was third on her Roth debut with a time of 8:41:41, rounded off with a 3:04:30 run.

But on Sunday she smashed that with 8:09:09 overall and a 2:45:00 marathon (her PB was 2:57) to see off British trio Lucy Charles-Barclay, Daisy Davies and Kat Matthews.

‘Best when I’m happy’

The build-up to the race had largely focussed on LCB and Matthews as the two big favourites, meaning Siffert was a little under the radar. But though she is only 24, she already has a whole host of long-distance victories on her CV, including the tough Embrun and Alpe d’Huez (twice).

Speaking the day after her victory to Laura Siddall, on the ground in Roth for TRI247, she explained why she relishes racing at full-distance: “I think I really like the mental aspect. You have to be mentally ready to suffer, to dig deep, to overcome the bad moment in the race.

“You really have to turn around a bad moment into a strength and I really enjoy that.”

The amazing environment at Roth also suited her perfectly – throughout the race she was responding to the crowd and she explained: “When I’m happy in a good place, that’s when I perform the best – I am an upbeat and happy person.”

‘I didn’t look back’

Talking through her race, she said: “I was just flying. I really embraced the race and the atmosphere, starting from the swim where you have the crowd lined up along the shore – I really used them as motivation.

“I came out of the water behind Lucy, but the gap was not that big and I just went for it on the bike. I thought, I want to be the first one coming riding up Solar Hill. And I caught her and I just didn’t look back.

“I just did my race, it felt like I was in a flow. I saw I was pushing big numbers but it felt good.

“I trust myself and my body and on the run I was kind of locked in and really focused because I knew it was a long race, you have to pace it, you have to stay in the moment.

“At the start of the run I was expecting them to run me down, but it didn’t happen. And I suddenly realised, hey, wait, I’m now in a position where I can win the race.

“If you would have told me I can win and do these times, I would have said no way.

“But I’ve trained so hard and I just enjoyed it – I think that’s what gave me so much energy to be able to put this performance out there. It’s just unbelievable.”