In Josh's game (the FTF game I play in), we've had two long term extended contests. One was precisely what you note, I seduced an NPC over about three sessions (she was married, and connected to boot, so yay me!). The second was between my character acting something like a detective, trying to discover what Ryan's character was up to in a murder mystery sort of situation. I won that one by getting a spirit of truth and unleashing it on the last exchange (with a bump, it ended up a Complete Victory). That was very fun.
I wholeheartedly recommend these. What's interesting about the second is that, when it would be our turns to have scenes, they were either tagged as being part of a normal round, or they were considered to be "unrelated actions". So nothing that either of us did wasn't framed by the overall conflict. If your unrelated action didn't pertain to the contest, then you were giving the other player the initiative.
So, use this if you really want to stress overall pacing with the mechanic. Use the loser method where rounds are conducted whenever for a more spontaneous flow.
Mike
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