A month and a half ago, my wife set riding a century as her 2015 riding goal. Her longest previous ride was 63 miles, four years ago in Ireland.

I offered to research a late summer, early fall organized ride without too much climbing. She said no, she wanted to do it without that much fanfare.

On an early Sunday morning ride in mid August, I added a couple sections to a familiar route that launches from and returns to the house. She doesn't track mileage. When we arrived home, I told her it was right at 34 and asked her if thought she could do it two more times. Her face brightened up, and she said yes. On Friday's last training ride, we found six more flat miles that stretched the base loop to 40.

Yesterday was the day. We launched with lights on at 5:30, and came in comfortably at 8:10. Forty miles down. I lost a coin toss with my oldest son, and he got to do the second loop with her, from 9:30 to 12:15. Eighty miles down. We waited to launch the last ride until our youngest daughter left for work at 2:30. By then, the weather had kicked up. We did the first section pretty much into the wind and then literally sailed home at 4:00.

101 miles! 6:55 saddle time. I don't think the extended breaks affected much, they were just a convenient way to break up the day.

Here's what I do think: that lady rocks!