Traveling does not have to derail your fitness. Keep your habit and maintain your gains using the hotel gym – even though the heaviest dumbbell is 50lbs.

I travel a lot between work and general roaming around the country, and these are the tips I use to maintain my fitness year-round.

Why Hotel Gym Workouts are Actually Effective

You have worked really hard to build muscle and your cardio base. The last thing you want to do is fall off the wagon on a work trip or vacation. Luckily, maintaining your gains required much less volume and intensity than building them. Muscle mass can be preserved with reduced training frequency, as long as intensity remains.

The secret to an effective hotel gym workout is to push every set to failure. Let’s face it, the weight available at a hotel will not help you to grow as a powerlifter. I have spent a lot of time traveling, and I am yet to see a 45-lb barbell in a hotel.

A hotel gym will traditionally only have dumbbells up to 50 lbs. This means that you will need to do higher reps, a faster tempo, and strategically select the exercises you do.

This guide will walk you through a hotel gym workout plan, allowing you to continue your running training and maintain your hard-earned muscle.

Understanding the Goal

You will find it very difficult and time-consuming to build muscle in a hotel gym. When you’re traveling, the goal shifts to retention. You are not trying to get bigger or stronger in a hotel gym – you are trying to prevent regression.

Remember, the goal of your trip is to accomplish some work initiative or to see more of the world, not to spend 3 hours every day working out. Your goal is maintenance in as little time as possible, and here’s what that requires:

• High relative effort – you should achieve or get close to muscle failure in every set (with good form)
• Sufficient volume – 2-3 working sets per muscle per session
• Consistent frequency – Hit each muscle group at least once a week for maintenance

Remember, in a hotel you are limited to 50lb dumbbells. To make this difficult, you need to focus on form, slowing your reps down, minimizing rest, and squeezing reps out of every set to failure. If the weight feels easy, add reps. Do not stop at an arbitrary rep count.

Hotel Gym Dumbbell Workout: Maintenance Split

Here is a 3-day repeating split that you can use on any number of days. Do it at least once a week.

These are the exercises I actually do while I’m traveling. Minimize rest, and each workout should take only around 30 minutes. These are basic movements but google them if you are unfamiliar.

Day 1: Chest, Triceps, Shoulders

1. Dumbbell Flat Press – 2 sets to failure
2. Dumbbell Incline Press – 2 sets to failure
3. Dumbbell Chest Fly – 2 sets to failure
4. Dumbbell Lateral Raise – 3 sets to failure
5. Dumbbell Overhead Press – 2 sets to failure
6. Tricep Kickbacks – 2 sets to failure

Day 2: Back and Biceps

1. Pull-ups – 3 sets to failure (if rack or tree available)
2. Single-Arm Dumbbell Row – 3 sets to failure per arm
3. Dumbbell Rear Delt Fly – 2 sets to failure
4. Concentration Curl – 2 sets to failure per arm
5. Hammer Curl – 2 sets to failure

Day 3: Legs

1. Goblet Squat – 3-4 sets close to failure (don’t be limping to your meetings)
2. Dumbbell Romanian Deadlift – 3 sets to failure
3. Dumbbell Lunge – 2 sets
4. Dumbbell Reverse Lunge – 2 sets
5. If you want, do some core work, like planks or Russian twists. I don’t.

Lifting Tips for the Hotel Gym

Choose a weight where you will reach near failure between reps 12-30. If you are an experienced lifter, this will be 50lbs for the majority of lifts. Some lifts are deceptively hard, like lateral raises and back flys.

Go to failure, but not quite on legs. I am a realist. If you murder your legs at the hotel gym, you will be limping around during your presentations and work. Don’t do this, instead stop the set when you get a good burn going. Don’t get delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) in a strange place when you are on the road.

Keep your rest periods down to 60 seconds or less. This will make failure easy to achieve on subsequent sets and will increase metabolic stress. The short rest period will help compensate for the lower load.

Try to do a slow eccentric to increase muscle damage and time under tension with the reduced load.

I do not bother to bring lifting shoes on trips with me, I just wear my running shoes to the hotel gym. This isn’t optimal but neither is being on travel.

The Hotel Treadmill: Keep Your Running Plan on Track

If you follow my blog, you know that I’m a runner, and I want you to be too. Perhaps you have just started running on your Couch to 5K plan. Maybe you are training for a half marathon, or even greater distance.

Whatever you are doing, you need to stick with your training plan. Vacations and work trips are some of the most popular times for people to lose sight and then quit on their goals. Don’t let this be you. Stay the course.

Tip: Make sure to track your run as a treadmill run rather than “run” on your Garmin/Strava!

Match Your Plan

Don’t just do a 30-minute jog after your lift. Do the prescribed run from your training plan. If you need to do a 50 minute tempo run, do a 50 minute tempo run on the treadmill. If Tuesday is a recovery job, then do that on the treadmill. Stay on course if at all possible, so you do not have to repeat a week when you get back.

Long Runs

A treadmill is not a fun place for a long run. Do it if you have to, but check AllTrails for a nearby area where you can go knock it out. Remember that this is a strange city and you need to make sure that the area you are in is safe.

If you must do your long run on a treadmill, set it to 1% incline to approximate the energy cost of outdoor running.

On Skipping

Try not to skip. I have done a couple hotel gym runs at night after team dinners, and it sucks. Try to do it in the morning if at all possible, but do it in the evening if you must.

If you are slammed and absolutely need to skip a run, don’t make it one of these:

• Your quality session: tempo or intervals to maintain your VO2 Max
• Your long run: outside if feasible

Your easy and recovery runs are the most skippable without significant consequence. Skipping your tempo and long run for 3 weeks straight is a problem.

Final Tips to Maximize Your Hotel Gym Experience

• Go early or late: you might be the only soul in there at 5am or 8pm
• Use supersets: reducing your rest time will keep intensity high and reduce the length of your workout
• Don’t skip the warm-up: this can help you prevent injury and perform better
• Stay hydrated: Duh, drink some water
• Eat a lot of protein: hotel buffet breakfasts are great for hitting protein goals
• Minimize alcohol consumption, especially before exercise
• Watch your calorie consumption eating at restaurants for every meal

The Bottom Line

Hotel gyms are not going to get you jacked like powerlifting will. They are however sufficient to maintain the gains you already have.

Remember: high reps, slow tempo, minimal rest, and sets to failure will keep you from losing your hard-earned gains.

Continue your training plan for running and you will stay on track without delaying race dates. There is not a good reason to stop progressing on your running because you are in a hotel.

Just show up, try, and be proud of yourself for not returning home in worse physical shape like most people do.

The information on this blog, Roam and Refine, is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended as medical advice. Always consult with a doctor or qualified health professional before beginning any new exercise or nutrition program. By using this site, you acknowledge that you are voluntarily participating in these activities and assume all risks of injury. Roam and Refine and its authors are not responsible for any liability, loss, or damage caused directly or indirectly from the use of this information.