I was up at 02.30am a couple of weeks ago. I wasn’t even riding my bike. I was my wife’s support crew for her Half Ironman. I’m one of those people who refuses to pack the car the night before in case the car gets stolen and you lose everything.
Got her breakfast ready, car packed, bike double checked and we on the road by 3.30am. She got signed in and I proceeded to sleep standing up. It’s my party trick 
Equal parts dedication and insanity 
My alarm is set for 4:20AM 4 days a week and don’t sleep much past that when I don’t have a workout to get to. I much prefer the mornings to the evenings. I don’t think I’ve seen past 10pm in a few years.
Up every morning at 4, coffee and protein, in the garage gym by 5:15. My day is half done before my wife gets out of bed.
Today…sleeping. Went to bed at 8:30pm thinking I’d be out the door to the group ride at 4:30am. No alarm. Thunderstorm woke me up at 6am. 9+ hours of sleep hasn’t happened since probably the 80’s for me. So stoked!
I don’t often (read=never) get started at 4am, but I love a 5:30 or 6am start. As many will have said, it’s so nice to get big rides in, and have the rest of the day in front of you.
Figuring out what to do with a puppy my family convinced we needed 
I have to admit it is being fun but not used to this early since kids.
Guilty… only time I can train though
Credit: https://www.instagram.com/stories/fucksrammemes/2621382384434625952/
6 is the best time imo. Watching the sun come up while riding but not needing to get up at a time that is quite literally still the middle of the night is perfect.
I hope you stayed in a hotel after…the drive home would be a death march. 
I’ve been getting up at 4-4:30am 7 days a week for years now. Started off with beating the Texas heat, that transformed into getting workouts done before baby wakes up. Now it’s still beating the heat and getting workouts done before kids need to be run around town.
Although right now I’m on vacation and was up at 4:30am with nothing to do but look at clear Montana skies (well when haze from fires is not around). Staying right outside of Glacier National Park in a cabin. I’m just going to move here.
Having small kids and with high summer temps, early morning (start at 6-7 AM) is the only time to ride, while being on vacation…but i find going to sleep early enough the hardest part of it all…
When do you 4-6AM guys and ladies go to sleep? How do you explain to your wife (and friends), you rather ride bike (and so must go to bed early), than hang around with her/them, after the sun goes down and chilling/relaxing/socialising is the proper thing to do on vacation?
To say, we’ve been together all day before that is dangerous thing to do…as they claim it is not the same with small kids jumping around…none of them feels the passion for bikes as my biking friends and I do…
How much sleep you need? When i ride bikes, 7-8 hours of sleep per night is obligatory to me…i’d prefer more though…
Usually in bed by 9.30/10pm, up @ ~5am, so average about 7 hours a night. It’s not ideal, I could probably do with 8 but if I train in the PM after kids are asleep, I either struggle to sleep so it impacts sleep more, or I skip the workout due to a tough day at work or mental fatigue. Doing workouts @ 5am help me keep consistent. It’s a balancing act and is definitely not ‘optimal’ but I don’t get paid to ride so it has to fit in.
Got up at 4:30 to do an hour and half on the trainer. Power wasn’t showing up in trainer road or on my Garmin head unit. Battery was fine, but I swapped in a new one anyway. Still no power. Ended up deleting and re-adding the Vector pedals to the Edge head unit and recalibrating them. They finally showed up successfully.
Ditched the 1.5 hour endurance and did a 1 hour VO2 workout. That was a nice change of pace!
I’m laying in bed by 8:30 asleep by 9pm. I don’t have much of a “social” life and I we go out I typically do an easy ride the next morning if it was a late night. I’m not a huge drinker either so that helps, maybe 10-12 drinks per year.
This mornings menu included over-unders. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays I’m up at 3:50 and normally on a bike by 4:00. No food, maybe some calories in my bottle. Gotta get the work done sometime since I have to be at work by 6:00 and never know what time I’ll get off.
How do you do that? I need about 45 minutes before I’m ready to ride, and I’ve been getting up at 4 am to workout for the last 20+ years. Water in, yesterday’s food out. All the other prep I could do the night before.
Ok, I’ll say it. At 4am, I am sleeping. What kind of a question is that?! 
I have got up earlier on occasion, of course. But I do like my morning sleep, it’s the best one. Recently changed jobs and now don’t need to get up at 5:30 for the commute anymore, it’s pure bliss.
