Thanksgiving lands on Thursday, November 26 this year, and for a lot of lifters in Las Vegas and Henderson that means a flight out of Harry Reid International, a drive to Southern California or Utah, or a week with a house full of relatives and no barbell in sight. December usually brings another trip. Holiday travel is where most training routines break, and the reason is rarely motivation. The plan only works in one gym, so when the gym disappears, the plan does too. This guide covers how Built Thru It Performance programs strength training around holiday travel: what to keep, what to drop, a three-session travel template you can run in a hotel gym or a guest bedroom, and how to come home without losing the rest of the year.
Can you keep your strength while traveling for the holidays?
Yes. For a one or two week trip, a few short, hard sessions are enough to hold your strength and keep the habit going. Strength built over months does not vanish in a week of lighter training. A travel week is not the time to chase a personal record, and it does not need to be.
The bigger risk comes after the trip. A lifter misses five days, comes home feeling behind, skips another week because the first session back sounds miserable, and suddenly it is January. The main job of a travel plan is keeping the routine alive, so the first session at home feels normal.
What should a holiday travel workout include?
A travel workout should cover the same movement patterns as your normal program, using whatever equipment is available. At Built Thru It, strength training is built on the squat, hinge, press, pull, and carry, and those five patterns travel well. Each one has a version that works with a pair of dumbbells, a resistance band, or nothing at all:
- Squat: goblet squat with the heaviest dumbbell in the room, or a rear-foot elevated split squat with your back foot on a bench or the edge of a couch.
- Hinge: single-leg Romanian deadlift with a dumbbell, or a hip thrust with your shoulders on a bench.
- Press: dumbbell bench press, dumbbell overhead press, or push-ups with your feet elevated on a chair.
- Pull: one-arm dumbbell row braced on a bench, or a band row anchored in a door.
- Carry and core: a suitcase carry down the hotel hallway with one dumbbell, or a side plank on each side.
Pick one exercise from each line and you have a full-body session. Olympic lifts and heavy barbell work can wait until you are home. A week off the platform will not cost you your snatch.
How do you train in a hotel gym or with no equipment?
Make light weight harder by slowing it down, pausing, and working one side at a time. A 25-pound dumbbell feels easy for a goblet squat at normal speed. Lower it for a slow three-count, pause for two seconds at the bottom, and stand up hard, and ten reps become real work. Single-leg exercises put the whole load on one leg without adding a single plate.
A few habits make hotel training simpler:
- Check the fitness center photos or equipment list before you book. Some hotel gyms have a full dumbbell rack, and some have one treadmill and a yoga mat.
- Pack a long resistance band. It weighs almost nothing, fits in a carry-on, and covers rows, pull-aparts, and banded hip work.
- Train early in the day. Holiday afternoons fill up with meals, games, and family plans, and a 7 a.m. session is hard for anyone else to schedule over.
- Take every set close to failure. With light weight, the last few reps do most of the work, so stop when you have one or two good reps left, not five.
What does a three-session holiday travel template look like?
Three sessions of 30 to 40 minutes spread across the trip will hold most lifters steady. Run them on any three days, with at least one rest day between the first two:
- Session A, lower body and press: goblet squat with a slow lowering, 4 sets of 8 to 12. Dumbbell bench press or feet-elevated push-ups, 4 sets of 8 to 15. Side plank, 3 rounds of 30 seconds per side.
- Session B, hinge and pull: single-leg Romanian deadlift, 3 sets of 8 to 10 per leg. One-arm dumbbell row, 4 sets of 10 to 12 per arm. Suitcase carry, 4 trips of about 40 steps per hand.
- Session C, full-body circuit: 20 minutes of rounds: 10 rear-foot elevated split squats per leg, 10 push-ups, 15 band rows, 10 hip thrusts. Rest as needed and write down how many rounds you finished.
If the trip only allows two sessions, do A and B. If it only allows one, do the circuit. One session in a travel week beats zero, because the habit stays unbroken.
How do you handle Thanksgiving dinner without wrecking your training?
Eat the meal and enjoy it. One big holiday dinner does not undo months of training. Skipping breakfast or doubling your cardio to earn the meal tends to start the restrict-and-overeat cycle that Built Thru It coaching works to end. A few practical anchors help on travel days:
- Get a solid serving of protein at breakfast, before the airport or the long drive to St. George or Los Angeles.
- Pack food you know you will eat, such as jerky, protein bars, or Greek yogurt, so a delayed flight does not leave you choosing from a vending machine.
- Drink water through the day. Dry cabin air on a flight, on top of the desert air back home, leaves most people more dehydrated than they notice.
- Take a walk after the big meal. It helps digestion and gets you out of the house for a few minutes.
If holiday eating is the part you always struggle with, that is a nutrition coaching question more than a training one. 1:1 Nutrition Coaching works on the habits and the mindset around food, not a list of foods you are not allowed to have.
Why does the week after a trip matter more than the trip itself?
The first week home decides whether the trip was a short break or the start of a long one. Schedule your first session back before you leave, ideally the day after you land, and treat it like an appointment.
For that first session, use weights a little lighter than where you left off, so each set ends with two or three reps still in the tank. You will feel stiff from travel and sitting, and a slightly easier session rebuilds confidence instead of punishing you. By the second or third session most lifters are back to their previous numbers. Then the normal program picks up as if the trip were a planned light week, which, with a travel template, it was.
Should you get a travel-ready program from a coach before the holidays?
A coach is worth it when your schedule is the obstacle. If you already know you have trips at Thanksgiving and again in December, a program that plans for them ahead of time beats improvising in a hotel gym at 6 a.m.
The Built Thru It 1:1 Training Only Program is custom programming built around your equipment, schedule, and goals, whether you train in a gym, at home, or a mix of both. Your plan is adjusted as you progress, so a travel week gets its own sessions instead of a gap in the log. Coaching runs in person in Las Vegas and Henderson or online. If you would rather run your own training and just want an expert plan for the holiday stretch, a 1-Time Strategy Plan is a single call with Alexa May plus a custom written plan, with no monthly commitment.
Alexa holds a B.S. in Exercise Science from the University of Louisville, USA Weightlifting Level 1 and 2 and CrossFit L1 and L2 certifications, and has coached more than 300 athletes since 2015. If you live anywhere in the Las Vegas Valley and want your training to hold up through the holidays this year, read about strength and performance training, see the Henderson personal training page, or book a free 30-minute consult and bring your travel dates.