Having a trip coming up is one of the most fun things to look forward to. While packing all of your necessary items, the thought of exercise probably crosses your mind. You may ask yourself, “Do I really need to exercise while I’m away?” The thought can feel daunting, especially if your bag is already full, and now you need to try to stuff your workout clothes in there too. 

While there is no one right or wrong answer to whether we need to exercise while on vacation, there are many factors we can consider. 

To answer your question of whether or not you should work out while on vacation, the answer is that it depends. Whether you do or don’t, how much, and what your workouts look like will look different for everyone. It will probably even look different for you from one vacation to another. 

Let’s start with the most straightforward scenario. If you are in a very serious preparation season for an event, such as a race or competition, it seems obvious that you’d keep up your routine while you’re away. In this case, it would be very important for us to prioritize keeping our exercise and nutrition routine as close to normal as possible. 

Working toward such a big goal would be a high priority, and therefore easy to decide upon. 

The gray area comes for the rest of the scenarios. What do we do if we are not in such a strict training season? It’s easy to have all of the intentions in the world to keep our routine, but it usually doesn’t happen the way we think it will. 

There are many questions we can consider when making your plan and setting your expectations around working out on vacation. The first one I like to think about is, “How do I want to feel while on this trip?” If feeling energized is important to you, it would be valuable to plan some exercise. 

If feeling relaxed and recovered is important to you and you’ve been training hard for a while, it may be valuable to prioritize rest. 

The next question I like to consider is, “What type of exercise would I really enjoy doing on this trip?” Maybe the way we move our bodies looks different than when we are at home. Vacations are a great time to try new things, especially if the location allows it. Maybe you try more swimming if you are near water, or hiking if you are near trails. 

There isn’t a set answer on whether or not you should exercise on vacation and how you should go about it. It fully depends on what you want to spend your time doing and how you’d like to feel. I usually exercise on vacation because it helps my body feel less stiff from all of the traveling, it gives me time to clear my head, and helps me feel better. 

I’ll typically do things that are completely different from my training plan to give myself a break from the gym.

I believe it’s important we move our bodies every day, but the way we do that can and should change. Taking breaks from our normal routine can help us recover, spark creativity, and find new things we’d never know we liked if we didn’t try them.