The Ultimate Guide to Working Out in Your Hotel Room
Eliminate many of the obstacles to staying fit while traveling by doing a bodyweight workout in your hotel room.
Most of us have little to no time for exercise when we're traveling.
If the time is there, often the desire to put on workout clothes and find the hotel gym is not, especially when it’s much easier to lay in bed and watch television.
When you put all of this together, it's easy to see why the gap between travel and fitness is often so wide.
But let’s face it, you need to exercise at least some of the time, and that includes while traveling.
There are actually some pretty good options for staying fit while traveling but what I've found works the best is one of the most simple solutions.
If you use your own bodyweight and exercise right in your hotel room, you eliminate many of the major problems you'll encounter when trying to stay fit on the road.
You don't need any equipment or a lot of time and you don't have to leave your room.
It doesn't get any better than that.
How to Workout in Your Hotel Room
Set aside a few minutes to work up a sweat without having to leave your room.
Make it a part of your daily travel routine by beginning or ending your day with your workout. Designate the time right before your shower as your workout time.
You can also set reminders or put workouts in your calendar to keep you on track. All you need is some floor space and as little as ten minutes of your day to move your body around.
If you're concerned about getting down on the hotel room carpet, there are two options you can try. You can place a towel or blanket down on the floor so you don't have to touch the floor.
You can also travel with a light yoga mat. There are some great, lightweight mats available that can fit in your carry-on.
If you choose the latter option, consider the Jade Yoga Travel Mat.
Remember to keep it simple. Exercises like push-ups, sit-ups, squats, and burpees will work your entire body and will minimize the amount of noise you will make. You can build muscle, torch a ton of calories, and rev your metabolism with just these three.
Jocko Willink's Hotel Room Workout
Jocko Willink became well known after appearances on the Joe Rogan Experience and the Tim Ferriss Show.
He's a retired Navy SEAL officer who served in Iraq, author of the New York Times bestseller Extreme Ownership, and an accomplished Brazilian Jiu Jitsu fighter.
He's also well known for his early morning routine that includes hotel room workouts when he's traveling.
Jocko is a big fan of bodyweight exercises, especially burpees.
What's his go-to hotel room workout?
First thing in the morning, do 100 burpees, rest one minute, and then do another 100 burpees.
Set a timer and record your time.
Remember that you don't have to do all 100 without stopping. Do five or ten and take break. Whatever you're capable of doing. Just keep your rest periods as short as possible.
As you get better at doing high numbers of burpees, you'll find yourself able to do more without stopping and your rest periods growing shorter. That's the progress you're looking for. That's you getting fitter.
The Benefits of Bodyweight Training
Using your own weight as resistance will build muscle and burn fat. It doesn't require weights or machines so you can do it anywhere (perfect for anyone who travels a lot).
The primary benefit of bodyweight movements are that several muscle groups work together. This causes the need for multiple muscle groups to work together to properly perform the movement.
So doing a push-up, for example, requires the chest, shoulders, triceps, abs, obliques, back, and glutes to all work together to lower your body to the floor and to properly get you back into the up position.
This triggers a metabolic response that will cause your body to burn calories long after your workout has ended. Muscle burns more calories than fat does.
Try an L-sit in in your room. This exercise is deceptively tough but has tremendous host of benefits, including improving your core strength and helping you reach your goal of having ripped abs.
All of your body weight rests on your hands, with your torso held in a slightly forward-leaning orientation and your legs held horizontally.
Work on holding the L-sit position for up to thirty seconds at a time and do that three to four times.
Bodyweight movements also have tremendous carryover to everyday life activities.
Performing squats will improve your mechanics getting up from a chair. Things like posture and muscular imbalances will improve. You will strengthen your muscles and joints, leading to less likelihood of injury.
This becomes increasingly important as we age.
The 10-Minute Hotel Room Workout
Ten minutes is all the time you need to get a great workout. Just carve out ten minutes of your day while you travel and you will be less stressed, more confident, have more energy and will be a happier person.
Bodyweight exercises are simple but very effective. They're a great way to build muscle, improve cardiovascular health, posture and flexibility. The best thing is that they require no machinery or equipment.
Use this 10-minute workout in your hotel room while you travel to keep yourself in great shape.
Perform the below workout on back-to-back days while you travel. Rest every third day.
Do as many rounds as possible in 10 minutes:
This workout is so simple, yet incredibly effective if you put in the effort. The key thing to remember here is that you're racing the clock.
You want to minimize rest during the ten minutes and do as many rounds as you possibly can before the time is up.
Record your progress and strive to get better every time you perform the workout, even if it is just by a single repetition.
Resistance Bands
Resistance bands are one of the most underrated workout tools out there. You’ll often find them neglected in a corner of the gym, but they are a great addition to most fitness routines.
From isolation exercises to bodyweight workouts, adding resistance bands will increase tension and improve muscle growth, while burning extra calories.
The best part of this resistance band praise is that they’re perfect for traveling. They’re small and light, meaning you can pack them in your carry-on and take them with you on the road.
So the next time you find yourself without an adequate gym (an all-too-common occurrence for travelers), just take your resistance bands out and get after it in your hotel room or outside.
The Hotel Room Resistance Band Workout
This is a full-body workout that takes less than a half-hour to complete.
Perform the workout as a circuit, doing 15-20 repetitions of each exercise for three rounds.
Push-Up
Lunge
Seated Row
Good Morning
Bicep Curl
Tricep Extension
The Bottom Line
Working out while traveling doesn't have to be a tremendous undertaking. Your hotel room provides adequate space for simple but effective bodyweight exercises, allows you to workout in the privacy of your own room and removes the burden of finding a gym.
