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Ok, I've registered for this event. As hard as beautiful, mtb in the Highlands for 900 km self-supported route.

RULES

Complete the entire route, under your own power - no drafting
Be completely self-supported throughout the ride - absolutely no support crews, absolutely no gear sharing
Only use commercial services that are available to all challengers - no private resupply, no private lodging
If you have to leave the route, you must rejoin it at the exactly same spot
No caches of any kind
No pre-arranged support, which means before you begin your ride - e.g. booking a B&B, arranging to meet a vehicle
No travel by any motorized means during your ride - by all means do so if necessary, but understand if you do your attempt is over
Gear - nothing required, nothing prohibited

http://www.highlandtrail.net/

And a clip from one of the descents in Torridon.
Rigid forks?

From what I can see of the route a lot of it is 'road' and double track so I suppose it depends if you think you'll gain more on the smother bits than you lose on the techy decents ??

From what I've read some riders run rigid forks, one of them both times he's raced.... must mean something.

Personally I think I'd probably be walking a lot of that video even with 150mm Pikes

Edit to add.

More reading and I've got to say most seem to be using a bouncy fork.......

Good article in singletrack about that race, one of the writers did it sounded bloody painful.

Javi ain't no normal MTB he's a mile machine, this will be right up his street, hell he even practiced with a ride to Brighton and back... Go Javi Go