So your body is a temple. You have your 5-a-day fruit and veggies. You only eat whole foods. You consider Ronald MacDonald to be the anti-Christ impersonate (well have YOU ever seen them in the same place at the same time?). But what happens when you are stuck in a hotel on business for a week?
Now I eat pretty healthily normally – I even eat loads of nuts, despite hating them, because people tell me they are good form me. And despite the fact I can’t for the life of me workout how they are healthy. But here is an average day for me working away:
5am – leave home. Grab an out-of-date cereal bar from the cupboard to eat in transit. Tastes like cardboard. No, actually it tastes like out-of-date cardboard.
7am – fill up with gas mid-journey and grab a pack of chocolate raisins. May look like rabbit droppings, but are the travel-food of champions.
7.15am – how did I finish all those? Feel sick…
9am – get to destination. Hand-shakes, polite-but-not-really-bothered greetings, and the commencement of a 10-hour continuous drip of caffeine.
10am – first meeting of the day. Cookies on the table. Well, I HAVE been up since 4.30am…
1pm – lunchtime. Local restaurant chosen by my hosts. Choice of burger, fish-pie, burger, road-kill salad, or burger. I opt for the burger.
3pm – more meetings. Mmmmm cookies….
5pm – catch-up with people. Chips from the machine anyone?
7pm – get to hotel. Hmmmm… free cookies….
9pm – out for dinner. Been eating all day so not that hungry. Have three courses, a couple of beers and feel like I have swallowed the Hindenburg.
Sound familiar? And this is without the dilemma of the hotel breakfast then next morning (“Continental breakfast or fried breakfast? Continental breakfast or fried breakfast? Oh look, mushrooms…”). It is so easy to slip into this routine if you spend a lot of time on the road, but how do you counter it? Here are a few hard fought lessons I use and have seen used (okay, they are mainly the latter):
1. Bring even more food!
But make it a big bag of bananas or a large bunch of grapes. Bang them in the middle of the table and say “help yourself guys” – few people actually will, but you certainly won’t eat the cookies in preference.
2. Fruity breakfast
Often your hotel breakfast is the only meal in the day you will have any control over – so take control! For example, eat mainly fruit if you know you are going to be in restaurants at lunch and dinner, or eat granola and dried fruit if it looks like you’ll be missing lunch.
3. Find a gym
Always pack gym clothes with you – a lot of hotels have an onsite facility and a swim before breakfast or an hour on the treadmill at night will claw back some damage. And if you always have kit with you, you’re more likely to go (funny how I am always ‘too busy’ to go to the gym when I have some sneakers with me, but can find time when they are in the garage back at home).
4. Don’t find a gym
How about having a set of exercises you know you can do in your hotel room? Press-ups, squats, weird-Bulgarian-things, etc.
5. Have a starter
Most restaurants will happily let you have a starter as a main course – great way of reducing the quantity, and starters are often healthier options (I’m not convinced the deep fried camembert works though).
6. Be a salad dodger
Just have a think about the ‘healthy’ salad you are choosing from the menu. Covered in mayo, piles of crispy bacon, chunks of cheese? Sometimes the grilled burger with homemade relish is actually the safer option.
7. See the bigger picture
Away once a month? Don’t get hung up about it – one day like the above won’t kill you. Away for the month? Every day like the above then… well, on the bright side you life insurance will be cheaper. Make it more than ‘just’ eating. “I’m on a health kick guys” – announce it to your colleagues and you’ll find they’ll support you. By being open, you’ll find yourself in more Sushi bars than Denny’s’.
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