Ahhh, the holidays. It’s a wonderful time of year, filled with food, friends, and family. For many, it’s also the time of the year some unwanted lb’s find a way to his or her midsection. This happens for many reasons: grandma’s cookies, beer, wine, candy and eggnog - just to name a few. However, there’s another big reason us fitness oriented people slack off on our training, travel - and that’s what this is going to focus on. Finding time, and equipment necessary to get a killer workout can be hard when you’re on the road. It could also be that you're not hitting it hard because you're with people who generally don’t care about fitness like you do. So how do we prioritize our fitness, and overcome the hardship of kicking ass on the road? It starts with your mental toughness and mindset.

In order to keep working out, you’ll have to dodge friends, and family who want you to sit on the couch and morph into the wonderfully baked goods you’ve just shamelessly consumed (please consume in moderation). Make it clear that you have to work out, and don’t fall into the peer pressure of, “just do it later!”, because later will never happen. Once you’ve made up your mind to stick to training, your creativity really is what sets limits for your training on the go. Have a park near by? I bet there’s benches you can do box jumps on. See that big hill over there? It’s asking for you to sprint up it 10x with a 30 second rest (ew). Really, there’s no right or wrong for figuring out a workout, but to be most effective, you should see what’s available around you, and vary the movements and times. This is necessary to keep yourself progressing in an even way.

The hardest part of this is finding equipment. When it comes to equipment while traveling, you have to be the most creative. If you want to do squats that are weighted, you can use a large river rock as a kettlebell (goblet squat). Benches are now box jump boxes, monkey bars at the local park are pull up bars, ledges or chairs are your dip bars, and any wall can be used for handstands or handstand pushups. Furthermore, an item that you can always bring with you on your travels is a jump rope - get one and throw it in your bag. These items will keep your travel workouts exciting, use them as much as possible, they will take you away from the monotony of just doing body weight movements.

Programming for travel workouts can be difficult and must be flexible, especially if you’re going to be in multiple locations, as your equipment will vary depending on what is around you. When you get to a new spot, get your bearings, and see what you have available. From here, there are some guidelines to make things most effective. These guidelines are as follows:

Vary the intensity and duration of your workouts.
Try to vary the movement types - IE, balance your weighted, body weight, and endurance movements. (can be done by taking a tally of your movements)
Try not to train the same muscle group repetitively.

Varying the intensity and duration of your workout does not need to be scientific. I’d suggest you take a piece of paper, and tally the workouts you’re doing for the week based off the their duration. Try to make them somewhat even between short and intense, medium length workouts, and be sure to throw some long workouts in here and there. This will keep you progressing in a balanced manner and optimize your fitness.

When looking at movement type, it’s obvious that weighted will be the hardest to hit. This means, if you have a way to weight movements, be creative with that weight. Try goblet squats, throws, and presses with your odd weight. Vary the movements as much as possible, as long as they’re functional and safe. Thrusters with a river rock may suck, but they’re super for getting a good workout in on the go.

The last guideline is something that I deem the most important. Many people get into the habit of doing what’s easiest while traveling. For example, pushups and burpees. You need to recognize that these movements hit the same musculature, and just as a proper program wouldn’t likely have you do heavy deadlifts one day, and then heavy kettlebell swings the next - your travel workouts should not be repetitive in this manner. Keep the musculature in your workouts varied, as to let your body recover. Remember, adding stress to your body is what we’re doing, and we need to let it adjust to see improvement and positive adaptation.

Be creative, be smart, and most importantly, have fun! You are traveling after all :)