What sort of bike prep is this? My bike’s a permanent fixture on my trainer, so essentially no bike prep needed. (Tho I will need t bring my laptop there, plug it in, plug in iPad w/ computer (charge) and that’s about it.
Always better if can get it done in the morning. After work is gonna be tougher for the motivation / tired after a long day kind of thing
I’ve also noted, after careful monitoring of HRV/metrics and how I feel the next morning, that any high-intensity (sweet-spot or above) workout after 5pm destroys my night’s sleep. So I’ve realized that I really need to move those workouts to the morning, ugh.
I’m gonna assume that you’re >40 (given your username) as well a knowing my own habits during my younger days. night workouts made me sleep better, but I do have to sleep later (8pm workout, HR doesn’t settle until like 11pm).
But now, I’m like you.
Yeah, 51. As a teenager, an afternoon hard workout was always perfect, I wasn’t a fan of mornings. Didn’t do anything from ages 19 to 49, and now any intensity at/after late afternoon trashes me. It was very much news to me!
welcome to “getting old” :-p
Water bottles and carb mix, check tire pressure, mount the lights since they are always in the charger, start the garmin, load the workout, etc. Sometimes i wipe and re lube the chain. It adds up for sure.
5am trainer workout?
Id just adjust the workout schedule so the hard days fall on work from home days
oh… you’re talking about an outdoor workout… My Bad. I tot indoors. Yes… Those things will add up (esp if you’re running latex tubes)
I forgot to mention coffee: of course, I will have coffee before my workout. Caffeine is one of the few proven and legal performance-enhancing drugs! 
When I was younger, I tried working out in the morning and absolutely hated it. That fundamentally changed when we had kids. Suddenly, I am really motivated waking up early in the morning as that is one of the few options to really have me time.
Yea I run latex lol.
I’m on the same schedule. A good dinner is important. Then I base morning food on TSS. Below 70 I just have an English muffin with honey. Above 70 I also have a gel at the start and drink mix. (And coffee of course, I’m not a heathen).
I’m with @patrickhill on this one.
I used to hit the trainer at 5 am 5 days a week, and I found that for sustained Sweet Spot workouts or harder, a gel ~ 20 minutes before starting and plenty of carbs in my bottles made a huge difference.
A nice snack a bit before bed, such as the yogurt/oats/PB you’ve mentioned won’t hurt anything either. 
I have been doing 5am workouts for a couple years now. I am on my bike within 10 minutes of getting out of bed. No breakfasts or coffee before hand. I do make sure I have carbs in the bottle though - even on z2 days. I have been using the Saturday app for a while now.
I was much like OP in that if I did not fuel on the bike in the morning I was hungry all day long. So while yes, I could do the workouts without carbs most of the time. The carbs saved me from overeating throughout the day most times.
Sugar water during then oatmeal and protein after. I just blend up quick oats and protein powder in my vitamix and chug.
89-100g of sugar in a water bottle.
I’m doing 6am workouts and do the following, just water for Z2 rides of 1h00/1h30 (during the week), and 65g of isotonic powder in a water bottle for Sweet Spot/Threshold rides of the same duration. Beyond 2h, I do 65g per hour for SS/Threshold.
Thanks for the replies all. Last week I tried this successfully. Wake up and immediately eat a grocery store variety blueberry cereal bar, or slice of toast with pb. 2/3rd scoop of gatorade powder for endurance rides, or a full scoop for SS/Threshold. So far so good, I’ve only had one day where I felt extra hungry and it was my recovery ride/strength training day for some reason… go figure.