Getting up early (Page 2)

I get up anywhere between 3:15 and 4:00 to get my morning workouts in.  For me, the most important aspects of getting up early begin the night before.  That means preparing everything I need so it is ready when I wake up (workout clothes, coffee maker with timer set, trainer set up in the garage if I am biking), and getting to bed early enough so that I get adequate sleep (by far the most imporatnt thing).  If I do these things, I find that getting up early becomes routine, and gets my day off to a good start.

The coffee pot/timer is a God's gift to the morning workout! But when I 1st started trying to pry myself out of bed for morning workouts several years ago, a few times I actually laid an Expresso Love GU (2x caffeine!) on my bedside table. Pop that bad boy immediately after turning off the alarm and there ain't no going back to sleep!

As others have stated, same for me dealing with the 4:45 AM buzzer - going to bed between 9 & 10, get in a weekly workout routine and 6:30AM on occasion is sleeping late!  Even getting up at 4AM on a few Saturdays a month for group rides isn't too bad.

 Hi Lori,  sorry, didn't mean to distress you! Hopefully everyones responses will just give you ideas on how to best approach your own training.  To answer your specific questions, my accidents all occured while riding on city roads, and all times of day (most serious one was actually daytime and on a road that did not have heavy traffic)- all it takes is one driver not paying attention or not obeying the rules.  I do find that some early morning drivers are not expecting any other people to be out, so they can actually be MORE dangerous.

I guess for me, I just found the risks I felt I was taking by riding in the dark was no longer worth the benefits (this is NOT a judgement of other peoples choices as obviously so many variables & factors weigh in to our personal decision making at any given time - esp since I clearly DID choose to ride at all times of day and night at various times in my life!).  What has tipped the scales in the past years is that I am a single parent, starting a new career and I have had so many things on my plate that any one peice falling out of place would cause the whole world I was building to collapse ... what would happen to my kids/work/home/school/ etc if I got hurt and was hospitilized?? Or even home but out of commission with a broken leg?  Just couldn't risk it anymore, right now.  And I am a nurse -so have seen and heard lots of horror stories as well.

 I actually did not ride much at all for at least the last year (two years?), and then trained exclusively on my trainer for my first HIM this summer as it was the only way I could fit the time in the saddle in  ... so if you do find that a trainer is the only choice for a while  ... you do what you gotta do! Good luck sorting it out safely.