Early morning exercise

[Dutch]

I am going to start rowing and bike erg first thing in the morning, soon after getting up, say 7.30 am. I aim to do 4 times a week. Currently am only managing 2 to 3 times at best, normally late afternoon and they are becoming less productive.
I always feel good after exercise and really need a better start to the day mentally. So I fathom this could be a positive thing for me.
What I would like to hear about is how do people who do train in the morning feel for the rest of the day and how they felt before they started training in the morning.
Is it really a good thing that can carry you through the day or a just a placebo effect that lasts an hour or so at most?

[mitchel674]

I'm at work too early on weekdays and wind up rowing when I return home typically at 6pm. On weekends, I typically row when I wake up at 6am. I really find those 30-60 minutes on the erg early in the morning followed by a protein smoothie starts my day off perfectly. I typically have a lot of energy for the rest of the day without fatigue.

[Ombrax]

Years ago I once (and once only) tried to do the "row first thing in the morning" workout, and found that for me it was not fun. The main problem is that when I first get up I am tight, tight, tight. Gradually as the day progresses my muscles loosen up, but at the beginning of the day I felt like I couldn't do anything vigorous, even though I tried to slowly warm up. Add to that the fact that I've never been a morning person, it was enough to discourage me from doing it again.

[Joebasscat]

Love it. 5am wake up on weekdays and I allow for about 30 minutes to shake the cobwebs out, HR belt, brush teeth yada yada... Light stretching and I get about 17oz of water in. (Size of my Yeti, not scientific).

Regardless of workout I warm up. SS gets a 1K gentle warm up and any type of interval gets another 2.5 to 4K WU depending on intensity. For me, at that time of the morning, I feel the warm up is even more important.

I never feel better in the morning than after my row. In fact on my rest day I feel somewhat sluggish without it. Now I do find I'm a little tired after dinner in the evenings but not through the day really. Just a natural wind down. Or maybe its just my age.

[gvcormac]

I bought a BikeErg largely so I could do a workout over my morning coffee and e-mail catch-up. It is great for that. I do 30 minutes and without me really thinking about it, my pace increases from 3:00 or worse to 2:30 or better. Genarally I cover between 10K and 13K meters in the 30 minutes.

Separate from this I do intense running or rowing workouts a few times a week. Not first thing in the morning.

I made a rudimentary coffee table for the BikeErg: https://studio.youtube.com/video/x_ef4RZGjyk/edit

[Dangerscouse]

I always row early, usually 6-6:30am. I definitely feel better after doing it, and I usually feel a bit tired, but I have a strong coffee, banana and about 300ml of water and a quick stretch and I'm ready to go after about 40 mins.

I highly recommend morning rowing if you can adjust to it, but it's definitely not for everyone

[Dutch]

Thanks all for the replies. Tried getting up this morning and it did not happen, a rubbish nights sleep and ended up rising at 10 30 am.
But I did cycle and hour later all be it 10 mins and then squats.
I am not really a morning person unless I go to bed at 10pm,
I think the first thing I need to do is get more quality sleep and do a little each day at ut1 zone work outs. No reason I cant ride or row 5 to 6 days per week just making sure they are easy to start with. I will gradually mix it up after a couple of weeks.
All this has come about really from just getting fitter and seeing more options of training differently because the fitness allows it.
An increasing fitness and strength level also gives the mind more confidence as well I am finding.

[Tsnor]

I think the first thing I need to do is get more quality sleep and do a little each day at ut1 zone work outs. No reason I cant ride or row 5 to 6 days per week just making sure they are easy to start with.

The additional sleep is a great idea and will help.

5 or 6 UT1 workloads a week is a bad idea if you believe the research. Elite athletes, college and national teams do not do this.

Stacking 5 or 6 UT1 workloads a week you will likely
1 - Get great results for 8-12 weeks.
2 - Eventually plateau where you will not make progress
3 - If you try to fight through the plateau with more work / higher load then you'll see your performance drop off and you'll get symptoms of non-functional overreach and overtraining.

Let me know if you want references. At this point this is established science. That said, its your body -- your choice.

[Dangerscouse]

5 or 6 UT1 workloads a week is a bad idea if you believe the research. Elite athletes, college and national teams do not do this.

Stacking 5 or 6 UT1 workloads a week you will likely
1 - Get great results for 8-12 weeks.
2 - Eventually plateau where you will not make progress
3 - If you try to fight through the plateau with more work / higher load then you'll see your performance drop off and you'll get symptoms of non-functional overreach and overtraining.

I stupidly followed this type of training years ago, and I definitely stagnated and got frequent illness.

I'm sure there are some outliers who can cope with this type of training, but I'd guess that 99.9% of people will always regress.

[Dutch]

Oops lol. Sorry I meant ut2, easy rows. I have just looked up ut1 and even I know that would not be good for me lol.

Tsnor, if you have any references to daily training or 5 to 6 days a week, that would be great. Just for some ideas of structure.
For now I just want to get used to doing a daily aerobic workout and they will be slow to begin.

I think maybe some workouts with step ups in spm, like a pyramid and things could be one. A ut1 could be one of them but I would probably do a shorter distance.

Like I say the first thing is to get used to the workload, even if it is easy its just getting the mind used to it.

[jerrytheplater]

In college way back in 1972 we rowed in the AM 6 days a week from late September to middle May. This was in Florida, so weather rarely cut into workouts.

While working and starting at 7 AM, it is just not possible for me to row in the AM. I'd have to get up too early and the noise of the rower would wake up my wife. Used to be concerned about the kids, but now we are empty nesters. I now row before dinner. Tried eating dinner and rowing at 9 PM, but that just made me wide awake and not able to get to sleep at a decent time.

I'm retiring in mid August and plan on rowing in the AM so it will allow me to do other things and not have to stop all to row before dinner. I have rowed early AM on Saturdays. I did find I had to warm up for a longer time than when rowing in the late afternoon.

[pagomichaelh]

I work out starting 0700-0800 most mornings because of the heat and humidity here, but it's during long lunch in my work day (I'll start work at 0430)

[gvcormac]

I Bike Erg for 30 mins practically every morning. This is time that I would otherwise waste checking email and drinking coffee. I still check email and drink coffee but I get between 10k and 13k on the Bike Erg.

Sometimes when I start I feel I'm nowhere near on pace for 10K but then it just happens automatically as I limber up.

When I'm rested I do 10K with HR 86. Occasionally I go harder and sometimes I do a more intense run or row in addition, later in the day.

https://youtu.be/x_ef4RZGjyk

[johnnyha]

I've always trained early in the morning - when cycling I was sometimes out the door at 4:30 to get 3-4hrs in (including commute) before work. Now I'm either on the bike or rower before 6:30 so as to get things done before work / family etc take over.

I normally have 2x double espresso and a pint of water before heading out, and a protein shake if the session is going to be longer than 1hr. Then a recovery shake as soon as I'm done.

Maintaining fuelling throughout the day (I find) staves off afternoon fatigue, as done some light exercise (30min walk etc) so you don't stiffen up.

By far the most important thing to help you train early will be going to bed early. If you've got a good night's sleep you can probably train a lot earlier than you imagine. When I was riding at 4:30am (4am alarm) I was always in bed before 9pm.

[Holly62]

My idea of early morning excersise is a steady walk with the dogs, I generally row sometime between 12 and 2pm, not later but not much earlier either.
Total respect to you guys that get out of bed and row or cycle, I'd just want to go back to bed after .
I don't row on my two work days a week, I tried early morning and after work it just didn't work for me, so didn't make my final routine.
I'm always in bed by 9 as part of my problem previously was a broken sleep pattern, night work, which I no longer entertain at all.
But every poster on this thread, has an excersise routine, and I think it's essential to build that routine into your life.
Just my opinion.