I'm IN! 
Looking forward to the weather forecast being wrong... getting a bit fed up of wet rides now!
Don't get your hopes up too much. I am one of Deano's little (or in my case not so little) helpers. As a helper you get to ride in advance of the event and still get validated, which helped a lot as I was too late for the Moors and Wolds which is a relatively easy 400k.
On the weather front, I think Deano has a direct line to the Norse weather god ,Freyr. It has to be Nordic as we're nearer Oslo than Athens and the weather reflects that.
Whenever Deano gets a completed entry form from me,I am sure he is straight on the phone to order up plenty of weather.
The Old Peculier- strong winds and snow on the hills- me DNS
Yorkshire Grit- brass monkeys were looking for welders all over Yorkshire. It hardly raised above freezing all day. O.K it was January .
Beyond the Dales- do you want wind , wet or cold? How about all three? says Freyr.
Yes please says Deano-make it hard , in fact the harder the better if they want to do that PBP thing.
So to this weekend. I had elected to ride on Saturday as my diary indicated an early start on Monday morning for a trip to Coventry for a business meeting or as it turned out , find the office block without a functional postcode or the aid of Google maps (not recognised your location).
As I didn't want to be half asleep at the wheel ,I opted for an early start on Saturday followed by a lazy Sunday to recover .
Although the forecast weather was scattered showers and sunny intervals,I also chose to ride without mudguards despite Mrs.M warning of the consequences.
Look ,I said, SHOWERS, no problem.
I set off at 5 a.m on Saturday and it was cold but not freezing, there was a niggly North Easterly wind but it was dry.
First leg up to Darlo was O.K, not fast , but fairly smooth. these were local roads for me.
Breakfast was taken by the Co-op at Cockerton Green and off I went to Staindrop.
This bit felt a lot harder than it should have and by the time I reached Staindrop, I had a premonition of failure.
My body was cold but my head was sweating like there was no tomorrow. Added to that my stomach was rebelling and I am very grateful that the parish council maintains some public toilets in the middle of town. Basic but functional.
My mood and demeanour didn't match the beautiful countryside.
At the end of the Beyond the Dales ride, the Revd. Graeme OTP asked if I had topped 50kph on the descent from Eggleston to Staindrop, so I knew what was ahead. (The answer,Graeme, is , yes I did-twice)
The long drag was tempered by the view and the never ending sound of curlews in the air and then without interruption ,I was falling like a stone towards Egglestone bridge. Take care on the descent as the bridge is a bit narrow.
Info control at Romaldkirk , then on to Barnard Castle ("Barnie" in localspeak) . I was looking forward to breakfast at Morrisons (oh the high life for me) but was dissapointed to find that they don't have a cafe. After using their facilities (again) ,I spied another cafe across the car park and went to partake of beans on toast .
A bit of food helped to restore some equilibrium , as did the long descent from Barnie to Whorlton bridge-another place that holds a few memories for me. The bash towards home was steady away but I never felt great. South of the A66, I found myself right behind what was obviously a very heavy downpour. There were still a few big drops in the air and plenty of water on the road.
I took off my soaking wet leggings as I had three quarter length shorts on as well.
A cup of tea at Boroughbridge was a good pick me up and then it was proper Great North road all the way to Ferrybridge.
Ferrybridge cooling towers are , for many , the signpost of real up north, so when you get past them and the M62, it's a different world.
This was where the weather kicked in with a vengeance.
The Clementson curse of wind rain and dropping temperature all combined to make the petrol station at Askern seem like an oasis.
(The Jet petrol station is to the left of the junction as you reach Askern and it has a Subway franchise).
Beyond Askern is MAMBA* country - boredom will overwhelm you ,although I did see a couple of deer by the roadside.
Belton was the usual forecourt experience , with the garage proprietor anxious to point out that the toilet was not for public use but only for emergencies. My emergency must have passed the test.
There's a bit of COR on the way to Horkstow bridge, which is like Whorlton without the scenery. Picturesque in the fading sunset.
Through Flixborough and somewhere round here, there is a short nasty little climb that warranted a skyhook , but unfortunately I didn't have
one in the saddlebag. From here, you can see T'Humber bridge and it's a nice gentle descent in to Barton to get onto the bridge path.
Thanks to Dean's excellent directions, for the first time,I managed to clear the country park without detours and get on the road to Welton.
Probably one benefit of riding alone is that there's no-one else giving their interpretation of the route.
It was now getting colder so I stopped in Welton for a picture of the church. Graeme is running a control there but I had to make do with a cold drink and a Mars bar, although the pub did look inviting.
Beyond Welton it was DARK and COLD. And then just as I got beyond the village lights,the batteries on my Garmin were flagged up as near to death, so I had to stop and change them.
As I don't have turn indication on the GPS, I sailed right through South Cave in blissful ignorance until I reached the Market Weighton by-pass.
A couple of miles of corrective action got me back on the Harswell road and the lowest point , geographically, physically and mentally.
There was cold fog all around and by the time I reached Elvington I needed a break. I was, in theory almost home but it didn't feel like it.
My feet were like blocks of ice and I avoided drinking as my water was so cold. After a short stop and some food from deep in the saddlebag,I was off again , only to be confronted by a yappy little dog in the middle of the road. I shouted loud enough to wake the dead and gained a new pair of legs to outrun it.
In York,I stopped at an ATM but as I grabbed the receipt as proof of passage , the ATM took back the tenner that I had withdrawn.
At this time of night,I wasn't going to bother with cyclepaths, so it was through the city centre, out through Bootham and up the A19 to Shipton.
The rest is a blur except for another ATM session in Boroughbridge to prove that I had done it.
As I removed my shoes,I was surprised to see all my toes still intact. On Sunday , the evidence of scorched potatoes on the allotment pointed to a ground frost.
The Clementson weather curse continues. Hopefully, I can attone for my sins by running a good control at Skelton on Saturday night/Sunday morning.
I look forward to seeing you all and hope you have better weather.
Just to rub in the salt, Dean did the ride yesterday.
The temperature gauge in my car showed 17 degrees at 4 p.m and the sun was still shining at 8 p.m.
There wasn't a drop of rain all day.
*MAMBA-miles and miles of bugger all
P.S Dean told me that he got cold later on.
