February - Century a month Challenge

I came up with an idea that me and Kate should ride from our respective homes out to Edale to meet for cake for our February century. For some reason Kate agreed that this was a good idea! So I plotted a route to get my century choosing to go the longer way there, hence avoiding Manchester and Stockport but crossing lots of hills, including a climb of Holme Moss (where they helpfully have a line marking every quarter of a mile as you winch your way up it) as well as various other killers. But I plotted the way back basically along the A6, through Stockport and Manchester, a much easier prospect and probably saved me jumping on the train! In preparation I got drunk! Ali and I shared two bottles of wine, neither of us drink a lot so we were very drunk. But the second bottle probably saved me as I started worrying and drank two bottles of water before I went to bed and another through the night, I woke up feeling fine!

There was plenty of snow piled up on the side of some of the roads and the off-road trails looked icy but the roads were clear, even the few back roads I ventured on - I mainly stuck to quieter A roads. I got to the cafe in Edale at about 1:20pm, we were both aiming for 1pm and thinking we might be late. Turns out kate had been there nearly an hour - she was worried how late she would be so left early! After a lovely lasagne and chips I got chocolate cake, but I couldn't finish it in fact I felt bloated after it. At that point we thought we should get moving - I think we had spent well over an hour in the cafe since I arrived. The cafe was at the bottom of a nice steep climb - in an earlier life I had never got up there - today it was slow progress but I never felt like I needed to stop. At this point the constant mist (meaning I had visibility of only a few metres, fun coming down the hills) had cleared and the views were fantastic along the valley, but once I got to the top I turned into a headwind. I was lucky though as it didn't last.

Then it was home via Stockport and Manchester, I felt strong on the way back which was good. I could have obviously pushed harder in the morning but I was worried by the climbing so didn't. I even stopped at the pub in Disley and picked up the glasses I had left there on tuesday.

103.98 miles

11.8 mph (I wanted 12, but I'm happy with this as going downhill was slow in the conditions when you are a wimp like me)

2791m of ascent