How to Travel for Work Without Destroying Your Fitness

You tell yourself this trip will be different. You’ll hit the hotel gym. You’ll eat clean. You won’t let the client dinners or late-night drinks throw you off.

But deep down? You already know how this ends.

Another early flight. Another airport breakfast. Another packed schedule where “I’ll just grab something quick” turns into whatever’s closest. Another round of drinks. Another half-assed attempt at the gym, if you even bother.

By the time you get home, you feel like garbage. Bloated. Exhausted. Convinced you just undid weeks of progress in two days.

And worst of all? This cycle isn’t stopping. Because work travel isn’t going away.

So if every trip leaves you feeling like you’ve fallen off track, it’s time for a different approach.

This isn’t about avoiding the dinners, skipping the drinks, or forcing yourself through some miserable routine. It’s about learning how to travel like the guy who’s actually in control.

Because when you get this right? The trips stop throwing you off. You stop feeling like you need to “reset” every time you come home. And your results? They stop depending on the calendar.

DM me “DESIGN” on Instagram (@spencerhgallo) and I’ll hit you with the exact strategies you can use on your next trip.

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Transcript

USB Condenser Microphone: 1:25

Let's go on a little business trip together... today. Imagine this, it's 3am, your alarm just goes off, but let's be honest, you probably weren't really sleeping because your body knows that it is a business travel day. You roll out of bed, you quickly shower, throw the toiletries into the bag that you packed, last night, and you step outside into that dark silence of the morning. You start to make that drive to the airport. It's normally 45 minutes, but let's be honest this early? you shave it down to 30. No traffic. no cops. park on the same parking deck, on the same level, Pretty much the exact same parking spot more out of habit than anything else and probably a little bit of convenience. You blow through tsa pre check because, obviously, you're not a peasant You're not waiting to take off your shoes or pull out your laptop You go straight to the mcdonald's, inside of the terminal because there's no starbucks. You grab that extra large coffee. Double cream, double sugar, sausage McMuffin with egg, two hashbrowns, down to the gate, you know the routine. You board early, because of course you do. You sit down in your aisle seat, always aisle. seats. Throw on your noise canceling headphones, and you ignore the safety pitch, because let's be honest, you could probably recite it in the sleep. that you're about to take. Next thing you know, take off, quick nap, and then wheels down. No check bag, just your backpack. It is all about efficiency. And let's be real, your boss told you that he would leave you behind if you ever checked back in an overnight. You get straight off the plane, fly through the terminal from the last gate, because it's always the last gate when you have somewhere to be, and you're off to the cab stand. You beat half the office to work, even though they live there. And you just flew a few hundred miles to get there. The first few hours? Normal meetings, emails, production work. You have that second coffee in that two minute transfer from one conference room to the next. You take lunch out with a team because you only see these guys once a week, and then the afternoon grind feels like Groundhog's Day of the morning. Then by four 30 off to the hotel check in before dinner, you tell yourself you're gonna hit the gym, but you already know how this ends. You sit in that uncomfortable Jess chair scrolling your phone, maybe get a quick change of pants or something a little bit more comfortable, and then you're down to the hotel bar for a pregame drink before dinner, and then dinner's long. Drinks, steak, bullshitting about the project, life, other work, and then, depending on which senior principal's with you, the“one night cap back at the hotel turns into closing the bar down, and then the next morning? the whole cycle repeats. itself. Maybe you drag yourself onto a treadmill, maybe you just get dressed and pretend that last night didn't happen. Meetings, lunch, and then by 4pm, you're calling your Uber from the elevator lobby to get to the airport, hoping that you can clear standby on that earlier flight home. Because if you don't, you're gonna end up at the airport bar, dinner solo, and by the time you land back home, you are absolutely tapped out. You swing through the drive thru on the way home, eat at the kitchen counter, and then you crash into bed. And in a few hours? that alarm is going to start blaring again, man, because the trip might be over, but work never stops and your boss expects a complete debrief of your trip in the morning. Now all the while, your health is barely keeping up. Let's be real, you probably left it before you even got on the flight. And here's the part that no one really talks about, is that you tell yourself, it's just a couple of days. I'll get back on track when I get home, I've done this before, I can handle it. But here's the thing, you're not handling it. You're barely surviving it. And that, that is the problem. Because this isn't some one time thing. It is every week, every month, every quarter, and every single time you go through it, it takes just a little bit more out of you. And you don't notice it at first. Maybe you feel a little off the next morning, but nothing major. You just need an extra cup of coffee to get going. And then that first workout back feels a little harder than it should, and then it just starts to stack up from there. You wake up feeling more drained than you do rested. You tell yourself you're going to hit the gym, but skipping one session turns into skipping the whole week. And then your gut feels off more often than not. You're bloated, you're sluggish, and you're just not quite yourself. And at work, you're still performing. But if we're being honest, you're not nearly as sharp. for the rest of the week. The little details start slipping. Your focus isn't quite there. You're keeping up, but you're not nearly as locked in as you used to be. And look, nobody's calling you out on it in the office, but you feel it. And if you feel it, you better believe the guys on your team above you are noticing it too, because the guys who are actually winning. The ones who seem to have it all figured out, they don't operate like this. They're not grinding themselves into the ground and calling it work ethic. They're not running their bodies at 60 percent and expecting their careers to climb at 100. They know something most guys don't. They know that when your body is running like dog shit, your performance is going to run with it. You think you're grinding? They know that you're just getting by. So, let's get real for a second. At first, it just felt like part of the job. You told yourself it was normal to feel like this. The early mornings, the late nights, the back to back meetings, the travel grind, just comes with the territory, right? Until you start to notice these things, the little things, at first. You catch a glimpse of yourself in the hotel mirror, shirt half buttoned, tie loosened, and something just feels… off. You look tired, and it's not just like, I need a nap tired, it's like deep tired. The kind that doesn't go away with a good night's sleep. And then, man, there's the gym. The one thing that you used to hit every single day without fail, and now? it just feels like a coin flip. every day whether you're gonna make it. Some weeks you drag yourself down there, half assing a workout just to say you did it. Other weeks, you don't even bother to pretend. You just tell yourself you'll get back on track when work slows down. But when was the last time that work slowed down? And then, one night, you're at another client dinner, another steakhouse, another round of drinks, the same conversations, the same industry bullshit, and the same damn food. Somewhere between that second cocktail and the waiter dropping off the dessert menu, it finally hits you."This is just… how life is now. And you don't know if that's comforting, terrifying. Because on one hand, you've made it. You're successful. You're in the room. You're at the table. You're doing the work that you fought like hell to be here for. But on the other hand, you're slowing down. And not in the obvious way. You're not missing deadlines. You're not getting passed up for promotions. You're still handling everything in business. But you feel it. That edge that you used to have. It's just not quite there. The energy you used to bring when you walked into a room. The way that you used to command attention, own conversations, and make decisions without second guessing yourself. It's still there. But it's definitely muted. And you don't feel as sharp. You're not as dialed in. You're not the guy falling behind. But you're also not the guy leading the pack, anymore. And that, that's the moment. That's the moment that you realize: this is not just about being tired. This is not just about one bad week or a couple extra pounds. This is about momentum. The kind that builds up… or slowly wears you down. Because what happens when you go another year like this? What happens when this isn't just your travel routine, but your default setting? What happens when you wake up one day and realize,"damn, I used to be way better than this? And the worst part? of that is you won't even know exactly when it happened. Only that it did. So, what happens next? Honestly, this is the part where most guys screw it up. They think, okay, next time I travel, I just need to be more disciplined. Tell themselves they're gonna hit the gym. They tell themselves they're gonna hit the hotel gym every morning. on the trip. They're gonna skip the drinks. out. They're gonna order the salad instead of the steak. And they do it perfectly. And then, they don't. Because they're trying to fight the trip instead of learning how to win the game. Let's make one thing very freaking clear. You are not going to be the guy eating grilled chicken out of Tupperware in the airport lounge. You are not skipping client dinners, sipping club soda while everyone else is having a drink, pretending you're cool with it. You're sure as shit not waking up at 5am to get crushed by some brutal workout in the hotel just to“stay on track. That is not the play. here. Because the goal isn't to survive the business trip. It's to learn how to travel without wrecking your progress. And the guys who actually pull this off, they don't do it by following some miserable, all or nothing plan. They do it by making small, strategic adjustments that start to add up. over time. Like knowing that you don't need a“Perfect” airport meal. Just one that doesn't set you up for a crash before you even land. Like understanding that a solid 20 minute hotel workout will do you way more than skipping the gym completely just because it's not your usual setup. And realizing that you can have the steak, the drinks, the full client dinner experience, and still walk away feeling like you're on track. And when you start stacking these kind of habits and wins, you stop feeling like every single trip is a setback. You stop coming home feeling bloated, sluggish, and pissed off at yourself. You stop looking at your routine as something you have to“get back to” because you never actually left it. And then suddenly, this thing that used to throw you off every single week, this cycle you thought was just part of the job, it stops owning you. Because now? you're the guy that knows exactly how to handle it. And that, that's the game changer. Let's be real, work travel isn't going away. The client dinners, the early flights, the late nights at the hotel bar, it's all a part of the job. But that doesn't mean you have to keep repeating the same cycle. Because at the end of the day, This isn't about a perfect plan. It's not about saying no to every drink or dragging yourself to the hotel gym at midnight. It's about learning how to travel like the guy who's actually in control. of his health. The guy who can handle the business, enjoy the trip, and still come back home feeling good. about himself. Because when you do that, you stop feeling like you need to“recover” every time you get home. You stop letting travel be the excuse that keeps you stuck. And you stop feeling like fitness is something you have to fight against. And once you get that dialed in, Your results stop depending on the calendar. and where you're going this week. So to wrap up, if this one hits home, if you know this is the piece that you need to fix, let's talk. Shoot me a DM with the word“design” on Instagram. No pressure, no bullshit, just some real strategies that you can use on your next trip. Because this is not about avoiding travel, it's about knowing how to handle it. This is Fitness by Design, and I will catch you in the next episode.