Maintaining workout consistency when traveling means doing something every day — even a ten-minute hotel-room session like 100 burpees for time, push-ups every minute, Tabata, or stairwell intervals — to keep your momentum and your head clear.
I travel constantly for filming, sponsors, trade shows, and vacations, and I never let that break the consistency I’ve built. On this Physical Friday I share the short, no-equipment workouts I do in hotel rooms when time is tight. They won’t build elite fitness in ten minutes, but they keep the streak alive — and that’s mostly the point.
Listen now: press play in the player above and follow along.
Do something every single day, even if it’s short. I keep a handful of workouts that take ten minutes or less and need no equipment, so a packed travel schedule never becomes an excuse to do nothing. The goal isn’t elite fitness on the road — it’s maintaining momentum so you slide right back into your normal routine when you get home, less sore and feeling like you never really stopped.
My favorite is 100 burpees for time — you can do it in any hotel room in under ten minutes and time yourself to beat your previous score. If you’re short on time, set a clock for seven minutes and get as many burpees as you can. Push-ups every minute on the minute, Tabata, and running the stairwell are all great too.
Do a set number of push-ups at the top of each minute for ten minutes. Thirty a minute gets you 300 push-ups in ten minutes; ten a minute gets you 100. Pick a number you can sustain. Doing 100 push-ups a day on the road beats doing nothing, and at 30 a minute you can rack up close to 10,000 push-ups in a month.
Tabata is twenty seconds of work followed by ten seconds of rest, repeated eight times — four minutes total. Pick any exercise, like air squats or push-ups. Your score is the lowest rep count of the eight rounds. If you feel good, do two rounds, maybe squats for one and push-ups for the other. It’s a fantastic, fast hotel workout.
Absolutely. Burpees, push-ups, air squats, Tabata, and the stairwell give you everything you need. Run the stairwell to the top, do five burpees, run to the bottom, five more, and repeat for whatever time you have. You’ll get your blood flowing, breathe heavy, and do something genuinely intense — no gym required.
Because the purpose is more mental than physical. A ten-minute session keeps you consistent, makes you feel like you accomplished something, gets your blood moving, and clears your head for the next meeting. You come home having crushed your trip and feeling like you barely missed a beat, ready to jump straight back into your regular routine without being wrecked.
I’m on the road a lot — filming, seeing sponsors, trade shows like ICAST, and plenty of fishing that isn’t work. If I stopped training and ignored my diet every time I left town, I’d be a mess. So I figured out how to keep moving even when the day is wall-to-wall meetings from breakfast to a late dinner with barely a window to breathe. Doing something on the road is crucial to my consistency. I explain the mindset in the episode, so press play in the player above.
These all fit in a hotel room and take ten minutes or less. My go-to is 100 burpees for time — warm up, hit start, and try to beat your last score. Short on time? Set a seven-minute clock and get as many burpees as you can. Push-ups every minute on the minute for ten minutes gets you 100 to 300 reps. Tabata — twenty seconds on, ten off, eight times — is four brutal minutes. And the stairwell is always there. I break each one down in the episode, so press play in the player above.
The honest truth is these sessions aren’t about building elite fitness — you won’t do that in ten minutes. The purpose is mental. You maintain consistency, you feel like you did something, you get your blood flowing, and you clear your head for the next meeting. You come home having crushed your trip and thinking, I didn’t miss that much — and you slide right back into your routine without being terribly sore. I get into why that matters in the episode, so press play in the player above.
Pick any one of these when you only have a few minutes in a hotel room.
I explain how to scale each one in the episode. Press play in the player above.
Travel is where most people’s consistency falls apart, and it doesn’t have to. Ten minutes in a hotel room keeps the momentum going and keeps your head clear for whatever you’re on the road to do.
Do something every single day, even if it’s short. Keep a deck of cards in your bag too — there are plenty of deck-of-cards workouts on tomrowlandpodcast.com. Press play in the player above and stay after it.
Physical Friday is my weekly fitness series for fishing guides, anglers, hunters, and outdoorsmen — the training, nutrition, and mindset to stay in the game for life. Watch and listen to every Physical Friday episode from Tom Rowland.
travel workouts · burpees · push-ups EMOM · Tabata · stairwell intervals · air squats · deck of cards workout · ICAST · hotel workout · consistency · Physical Friday
I’m Tom Rowland, a professional fishing guide based in the Florida Keys, host of the Tom Rowland Podcast, and the longtime host of the Saltwater Experience television show. On the podcast’s Physical Friday series I share the training, mobility, nutrition, and mindset work that keeps me — and the guides, anglers, hunters, and outdoorsmen who listen — strong enough to keep doing what we love for life.
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