Episode 165 - Don & Derek: Health & Fitness Challenges Associated with Travel

In Episode 165, Don and Derek share their stories about recent long-haul trips and the challenges they faced with everything from sleep to hydration to nutrition and workout facility accessibility.  While even short-haul travel can take a toll on your energy and overall health, longer trips over numerous time zones can present even greater challenges and stressful moments.   

Sleep is always the main priority, as jet lag can disturb energy, productivity and overall enjoyment.  Hydration also plays a bit part in facilitating good sleep, exercise and overall resiliency to injury and illness.  Accessibility to healthy and familiar food can also be a challenge, and some individuals may choose to bring specific snacks or supplements to fill in gaps.  And, finally, finding good facilities, environments and equipment abroad can take a lot of research, planning and preparation.  Doing all of the legwork ahead of time can be extremely beneficial in making sure your travel goes much smoother with less stress and anxiety.            

The D&D Fitness Radio podcast is available at the following locations for downloadable audio, including:  

iTunes – https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/d-d-fitness-radio-podcast/id1331724217  

iHeart Radio – https://www.iheart.com/podcast/dd-fitness-radio-28797988/  

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Spotify –  https://open.spotify.com/show/5Py2SSPA4mntNwYRm0Opri    


You can reach both Don and Derek at the following locations:  

Don Saladino: http://www.DonSaladino.com
Twitter and Instagram - @DonSaladino
YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/donsaladino  

Derek M. Hansen: http://www.SprintCoach.com
Twitter and Instagram - @DerekMHansen
YouTube - http://youtube.com/derekmhansen

Episode Transcript

(00:14):
Welcome to the D and D FitnessRadio podcast, brought to you by your
hosts Don Saladino from New York Cityand Derek Hanson from Vancouver, Canada.
Uh, how's life Berlin? Definitelymore more fatigued from traveling than I thought

(00:39):
i'd be. But why know,I mean, I think I'm getting old.
Yeah, you know, it's interestingI think coming I mean, your
time zone is different because you're nowback another three hours, so you go,
what six hours forward plus three fromme? So what are you nine
hours off? Yeah? When Ifirst traveled, there was an eight hour

(01:00):
difference and then they had like adaylight saving thing before I came back,
and now so now it's nine hours. Yeah, so eight to nine is
big. I mean for me,it was five and that's still like I
think it was five when I wentto Austria last week two weeks ago,
and and I think it was thesticks in London or five in London recently

(01:23):
in December. Regardless. It's just, you know, it's tough. I
mean, I think it's way morehard going there, like going there.
It's just east eastbound is harder.Definitely, it's a shit show. It's
it's that's really difficult coming back.I feel like it was a little it's
a lot better actually, but Imean, let's let's talk about it a

(01:47):
bit. Things. What are somethings that you do to try and you
know, minimize jet lag or avoidit or recover from it. Well,
first first is try not to flyeconomy and uh and uh because on the
way I was supposed to have businessclass both ways and then there was a

(02:09):
mix up or something and I don'tknow, I had to rebuy a ticket
to go there, and so Iwas in economy. Oh god right,
and so that's whatever. Nine hoursin economy. And on the way back
was was business class, which wasgood, but wine I was aloftwnza nice.

(02:34):
Yeah, it was a good airlineand and you know, it wasn't
too bad an economy. But theproblem is I'm traveling during our spring break
and uh, there were like tonsof school kids on the fre complaint.
Uh. You know. I wassitting next to a teacher and she's like,
oh, yeah, you know,we're going to Italy. I'm like,
oh, that's a great vacation foryou, right in charge of like

(02:57):
sixty kids. But but yeah,it was I think, you know,
that makes a difference though, likebecause I was in a window seat and
getting up to walk around and stretchmy legs much more difficult than on the
return back. And so I thinklittle things like that that you can do
to mitigate some of the problems willmake a difference. And then when I

(03:20):
got there, and then I didn'tI didn't really sleep, you know,
because of that on the plane.So then I'm in a deficit. I
get there at so I leave onbasically I left Sunday afternoon, and then
I get there Monday at like noon, you know, and then I still
have a day where I have tolike deal with people and meet up with

(03:44):
the client. And how much yousleep on that how much you sleep on
that flight? So you so youwent off no, like an hour or
maybe I dozed off, but thenyou know, and then you know,
you gotta you gotta be awake toreceive your meal, and it's not like
they wake you up and anyway,so I was just like whatever, So

(04:05):
I tried to tough it out,which was probably dumb. I probably should
have slept. Forced to sleep onthe plane. Yeah, So I was.
And then then it took me likesix or seven days to recover from
the jet lag, right, Iwas, I couldn't fall asleep when I
needed to, and then i'd waitor you know, i'd get like four
hours in the night and then i'dhave to nap during the day, and

(04:26):
then that just exacerbated everything. So, yeah, it's tough. It's not
fun. No, I remember,my god, So I remember going over
to London in December. Sorry,I've done that like three times today so
far. I'm a coffee pit,you know. I remember going over to

(04:49):
London in December. I was ona red eye and I probably slept four
hours. Fortunately the production company flyingme over there. I had to lay
down flat, which is nice.But you know, it's so you pick

(05:10):
up four out of the you know, three or four hours out of the
six and I think that's you know, the flight's probably six seven hours,
so that's really helpful. But youstill get in and you know, you're
on just a completely different You're you'refighting, you know, to get to
the evening. And I remember goingto sleep and I think eight or nine,

(05:33):
being like I'm good, this isgreat, Like I'm exhausted. I
remember going to bed and I rememberopening my eyes and being like, oh
my god, it's the morning.I'm so happy. And I looked at
the eleven o'clock it was eleven thirtyat night, and I'm like, holy
shit, this is not going tobe good because I was I was awake
and you know, laying in bedfor two three hours and then having to

(05:55):
be up with the client, youknow, early the next day, and
you know, I really think someof the advice is like that next day,
you just gotta grit it out.You just have to. I would
even recommend, you know, notgoing to bed at like seventy eight,
which you would think is like,oh, that's a normal hour, Like
I go to bed at eight athome. Like I would even push it

(06:16):
and try and make it to teneleven at night, just so you can
at least, you know, tryand sleep through the majority of the night.
And you're not, and you're notkind of you know, tossing and
turning and laying in bed staring atthe ceiling, and then you start getting
anxiety because you're like, oh,I got to be up at you know,
four thirty in the morning, andlike it's it's you know, when

(06:38):
you can't sleep, it's not fun. But there's so many and you get
it now, like you understand whydo so many people get hooked on sleeping
pills, And you know it's it'syou know, when you can't sleep,
it's and you're sitting here in anxietyand not sleeping when you know you have
a busy data next day. Itsucks. It's not fun. So you

(07:00):
know, people are pounding ambient orthey're taking melatonin, which I know is
you know, I'm still not ahuge fan of melatonin. I'm just I
feel like, you know, thebody produces melatonin. If you get so
hooked on it, it does thebody stop producing melatonin because you're supplementing it
in right. But you know,things I'll bring on the road like magnesium,

(07:24):
you know absolutely, you know ltand you know there's certain supplements that
I'll take that you know, Ithink help relax me a bit. But
you know, I know when I'mon the road, it's you know,
exercise very important. Like when Igot in to London, it was going

(07:45):
to the gym, right it was, you know, I was there on
work. So for me, itwas like going to the gym, sweating,
moving mobility, you know, andyou're dragging ass a little bit.
But I remember my workouts were prettygood over there. I was like,
Okay, I'm good, I'm allright, I'm right, all right.
You go on set, hang outon set, and you try and bows
some time in the city, andI remember scheduling appointments to work with a
bunch of editors, and like,you really just want to try and allow

(08:09):
yourself to be busy, because ifyou're going to take a nap, you
better make sure it's a thirty minutenap, because if you fall asleep for
two two and a half hours,you are screwed. You were going to
be up all night. And that'sthat's that's a big no note for me.
What else, Yeah, that's true. Like the anxiety of knowing I'm
not getting enough sleep created more problemsfor me getting enough sleep, Like just

(08:31):
thinking all you said, Yeah,yeah, that's why I'm wondering, Like
you know, I'm wondering if someoneis let's say this, say you're a
very disciplined person. I've taken ambientin my life, I think once,
maybe twice, and both times wereon planes because I struggled to sleep on
planes. So I remember both timesa friend of mine had it, gave

(08:54):
it to me. I took itand it knocked me out. I was
actually thrilled I took it. ButI can stand out that could become a
problem because if you start relying onthat, or you're like I can't get
to bed and I'm gonna take anambient and your body's relying on the ambient,
and when you don't have it,what happens? That becomes really dangerous
territory in my opinion. In myopinion, but if you were let's say

(09:18):
this, I'd love to bring outresearch expert on here to talk about this.
But like if you were to goaway, you're flying east over to
Germany, and you were to takeit, say three four nights in a
row, and you were disciplined enoughto get off of it, I couldn't
imagine that's a bad thing. Iwould be curious to know. Like that

(09:41):
stuff scares me. Like I alwaysthink, like, okay, that's the
gateway drug to like you know,propofall right, doing the Michael Jackson thing.
Yeah, yeah, and so yeah, I'm I've never tried it.
I have friends who are prescribed them, and I'm like, you need to
get off of that. Like I'malways worried about long term effective like is

(10:01):
that affecting potential, you know,a risk of like dementia or something like
that later in life. So yeah, I haven't tried any of that stuff.
I was trying. You know whatI forgot to use, well,
I had it with me was theapollo neural. That's it. By the
way, I flew with that.I used that when I was in Austria

(10:22):
last week. I thought, Iyou actually I used that in Germany and
it did it does it listened?It helps one hundred percent helps. Like
I'm I'm so hooked on this thingright now. My wife has been using
it. She can't fall asleep earlyevery night, she's in bed early.
And to be honest, since I'vebeen using it, I can't keep my

(10:43):
eyes open eight o'clock. I amlike out. And the one area that's
really improved on me is my rem. And I don't know if they necessarily.
I could never get according to myaura. I always struggle to get
in the blue on my REM.And when I say struggle, I mean
i'd say probably I would hit myrem maybe five percent of the time,

(11:05):
not even ten percent of the time. That's how minible it was. But
right on the cusp of like beingacceptable and then them singing the red saying
you should think about this. Andsince I've been using Apollo, I'm hitting
my rem probably ninety percent of thetime now, So that's one area that
I know. I know they're claimingthat it helps with HRV, and I
actually did see a little bit beforeAustria. I saw an improvement in the

(11:28):
last couple of months to my HRV. But since I'm back, my HRB
is a little bit low right becauseI'm still I'm still a little bit fatigued.
I landed from Austria last Wednesday.I was on a plane in Nashville
on Friday. Nashville is an hourback from here, so I went in

(11:48):
the other direction. And Nashville wasn'treally a RESTful two days because we were
down there were friends celebrating Easter,so we're having some fun and up late
at night and not eating as welland not hydrating as well and doing these
things. So when I got backthis week, like I'm just starting now
to be like, all right,you know, I'm starting to feel,

(12:09):
you know, really good. Butcome the afternoon and evening that's where I
see the effects. It's not asmuch in the morning. It's come to
the afternoon and evening. I stillfeel like my clock is five hours ahead,
where like right now in Europe it'syou know whatever, there's seven,
eight o'clock at night. It's like, all right, that's about the time
we'd be at dinner and we retiredand going to bed. So the body
takes a beating, really does thesetime zone changes. It takes a massive

(12:31):
beating. And that's what I respectabout. You know, when you think
about athletes, Derek in the US, it's one thing that you know,
in the US, what are theyreally changing times? It's never getting worse
than three hours, right, Like, that's not that's not so bad when
you look at these actors, right, Like, if you're looking at actors

(12:52):
like the person you might be workingwith or people I've worked with, and
their time zones now are changing eightnine hours and they're landing on a Saturday
and they're starting to work on aMonday, that's scary stuff. You know
what's really scary about the fact that, like they got to run lines and
when they're messing lines up. It'snot like you or I where we could

(13:13):
just hit stop, edit it andre record it. Like you've got a
whole entire production company that's sitting therewatching you. You've got a staff sitting
there watching you. Imagine being upat three in the morning, knowing that
you have to wake up in ninetyminutes and you've hardly slept because your jet
lag, and you've got to beon a film set for you know,
nine ten hours that next day.That to me, it could be really

(13:35):
really scary. Yeah, we wereup at five am to do workouts and
then yeah, he had to havebreakfast and then he was got to get
ready to go. And on topof it, they were shooting this production
in film, not digital, sothey you know, you don't want to
be wasting film, right, Soyeah, it's a shot with film film.

(13:56):
Yeah, huh, Yeah, Ididn't. I didn't even know that
was still a thing certain directors.That's you know, I think they feel
like they're cheating if they're using digitalor something. Right. So, yeah,
but here's a couple of things Iwant to want to get your opinion
on. Like, there were acouple of adjustments. One was, and

(14:18):
we'll get into like food, butone was like I think like my skin
and everything. I felt like Iwas dry all the time and I don't
think it was a humidity thing.But somebody's saying, well, maybe it
was the water, like the wateryou showered in and the water you washed
your face in. Maybe it's justdifferent. I don't know if you've noticed
that, but I felt like Iwas just like I'm not going to say

(14:41):
dehydrated, but just dry, likemy skin was my hands felt drier.
And now that I'm home, everything'sback to normal. I don't know,
or it could have been. Youknow, it could have been. First
off, it could have been theflight. I mean, when you're in
a flight eight nine hours, likeyou better make sure you're drinking enough water.
It's probably one of the first thingsthat I tell people to do and

(15:03):
listen. Water and airports are expensive. Like you'll go in for a five
hour flight, I'll get myself atleast two one liter bottles of water.
I mean it's a lot of water. I mean I've been I've been on
flights LA where I've been known topack three. You're purchasing three bottles of
water at you know, nine tenbucks a pop, which you're charging the

(15:24):
airport three dollars for water. That'sridiculous, right, But it's still like
almost a non negotiable with me.I'm not going to not do it because
you know, I'm paying a coupleextra bucks. But I think that's like
the number one thing that I'm tellingpeople to do on these longer flights.
And then you know, on topof it is like hopefully you can avoid
alcohol. I'm not a big drinker. Right when I went to Germany,

(15:45):
I sure as I'm sorry. WhenI went to London a couple of months
ago, did not have a cocktailat all. Don't don't drink. When
I went to Austria, we wereit was vacasioned, so you know,
you have a couple of beers.But I remember even on the flight over
there, I think I had aglass of wine at dinner, and then
when I got on the plane,I didn't have anything, and I just
passed out hard, and you know, woke up in a much better place.

(16:08):
And yeah, late in the dayyou're fighting in a bit, that's
when you start fighting it. ButI also think one overrated. I'd say
one area. I don't want tostay overrated, but that's that's the wrong
word. Almost underrated area would bean area called grounding. I don't know
if you've read much about this groundingor earth thing, and it's you know

(16:30):
the fact that you'd walk around,you know, barefoot and you know,
connect with the energy from the earth. And I know that sounds very like
Kumbai yah, but there's like scienceand research behind this where you know that
could become really healthy. That isvery healthy in general to do. Like
we want to be walking around outside, but I know when you're on a
trip and you're changing time zones,I know, trying to connect with the

(16:51):
earth and walking around barefoot for fifteentwenty minutes or getting outside and getting that
natural some light and getting that freshair can be really beneficial first thing in
the morning. You know, it'stough to do when you're in at a
ski resort and there's snow all onthe ground, right, so there's you
know, areas there that aren't goingto be that you're not going to be
able to you know grab. Butyou know, if you're traveling spring,

(17:12):
summer, fall, and you havethe ability and it's a warm day to
get outside and you know, walkaround barefoot in fifteen twenty minutes, you
know that on top of hydration canbe great. Actually be a place that
we went to had this incredible recoveryarea and there where they had these like
old school saunas and infrareds and theyhad a really cold plunge. And I

(17:37):
found that at the end of everyday we would go in there before dinner
for it was actually, oh mygod, it's so nice, like just
to have access to that for sixteento ninety minutes and we would, you
know, we would go in thereand we'd sweat, and I felt like
we were able to get a lotof the you know, a lot of
that junk out of us, andyou know, we would jump into a
cold plunge and experience different types ofhot cold contract you know, contrast therapy

(18:00):
modalities and you know, taking likea great shower down there and getting them
your clean clothes and then going todinner. You just felt better. You
just felt cleaner. So, youknow, I sometimes I even tell people
if they're if they're traveling for aproject and you know, their project is
very is a short window where theyhave to work and they have time during
the day, you know, tryand find, you know, some recovery

(18:23):
facility, you know in the citythat you're in where you can go and
just stay active. I mean,exercising and you know, doing some saunas
and doing some coal plunges. Thisis gonna, I think, get your
mind and your body into a betterplace where you're going to be able to
recover a little bit better. Thisisn't going to be you know, this
isn't going to be an ultimate cureto jet lag. But I think when

(18:45):
you start layering these modalities and thesethings on top of each other when you're
traveling, you can eat up andeat up some good time during the day
where you'd typically want to go backand take a nap and then you would
you know, be up all night. How about food? Do you take
stuff with you just in case,like you packing stuff and just making sure

(19:07):
that okay if there's a if it'sa shit show on the other end,
with food, I got something.It depends, right, It depends on
where I'm going and who I'm goingwith. Like on a vacation. The
answers probably know I'm on planes,Yes, Like I will pack stuff for
the flights because I think that alsohelps with air travel, right, if
I'm able to eat you know,higher quality things on the plane, whether

(19:29):
it's real food or whether it's youknow, even be packing protein powder and
packing some nuts or packing some youknow, other types of foods that I
can have on the plane, andmixing my water and using a blender bottle
that I think is helpful just tokeep kind of protein high. And you
know, again supplements like you're usingthis as a supplement to be able to
you know, help with recovery andhelp you in a little bit more of

(19:52):
a stressful environment, which air travelcan be. So yeah, I think
the air travel piecys the only timeI am packing stuff if I'm on the
road and I'm going to be eatingthat way on the road. As if
I have like a I have toshoot a cover or something like that,
which fortunately I've shot a dozen covers. I think maybe one time I had
to travel in LA for a shortperiod of time where I packed my meals.

(20:15):
Otherwise it hasn't been frequent enough towhere I've really had to worry about
it. And when I would getto those cities, i'd always research healthy
eating spots or I'm known for likebeing in the lift car or the car
service taking me from the airport tomy hotel, and I'm on there on
door Dash, I'm on there onUber eats and I'm checking out all right,

(20:37):
healthy eating spots. Wow. Mostof the time, I'm placing an
order as I'm in the car.How long is the ryde thirty minutes left,
forty five minutes of deliver I'm hittingyou know, I'm hitting by on
that, and I'm putting a foodorder in and you know, I'll eat
that meal. I'll unpack, I'lleat that meal, and I almost feel
like I've established that meal. I'mgetting my blood shirt to a good point

(21:00):
now. And then what I'll endup doing is probably you know, normally
I'm taking a shower and maybe goingto the gym. I'll shower again after,
but like that shower after the planeride, I think, really,
I feel like it cleanses me fromall that that recycled there and you know,

(21:22):
being in that tight quarter for asmall period of time. And I'll
go to the gym and maybe dosome steady state cardio, just sweat and
get things moving, and then it'slike, all right, I might go
try and find a whole foods ora grocer, a supermarket or something and
stock up on things that are goingto allow me to supplement and be successful
during the week and Yeah, ittakes a little bit of time to do

(21:44):
this stuff, but you're going tofind that when you return from these trips,
you're not playing catch up as much. But I think the first thing
that you got to focus on,you know, is definitely that hydration piece
is one of the most you know, overlooked areas, and people want to
go right to that cocktail just becauseyou know they know it's going to knock

(22:07):
them out, and you're dehydrating yourself, and you're getting yourself into a dehydrated
state on that plane, and Ithink that's just throwing a gasoline on a
fire you're trying to put out.Have you ever done any like creatine supplementation,
because i'd heard as the recommendation wasyou take creatine before you get on
the flight because it helps to retainthe water. Interesting, I'm normally flying

(22:30):
out most of my flights are inthe morning, unless I'm flying to Europe,
so I'm normally taking creatine anyway firstin the morning. I kind of
make this morning elixir where I'm puttingin a greens or redspowder and I'm combining
creatine with alglutamine and I'm mixing thatin and I'm putting that down and then
I'm having breakfast and I'm showering,and then it's car to the airport.

(22:52):
So when I'm normally traveling somewhere orthat might be after a workout. So
what I in a perfect world,I'm booking my flights in morning where I
can wake up, do a littlebit of work, get at least one
meal in, get a workout in. And I think in a perfect world,
I like to have my ride pickme up at about you know,

(23:12):
ninety nine thirty ten o'clock. Andif I'm flying somewhere in the US,
if I get on eleven twelve o'clockflight, you know where my flying regional
stuff Chicago, Orlando flights, Ihave to take a lot Atlanta, you
know your Nashville, which I justwas in. I just had to book
another trip. It's two hours.I'm you know, regardless of times,

(23:34):
don't change. If I take offat twelve, I'm getting in there at
two o'clock and you know, carservice to the airport, you know,
three o'clock, and then it's youknow, whatever it is. At that
point, it's kind of getting organizedand figure out my day is going to
be. Finding out work without dinner, kind of getting situated in the hotel
and then getting to bed early andgetting a good night's sleep. I also
like booking my flights around that timebecause you never know what delays. Right,

(23:59):
if I'm trying to push the dayand get on a six o'clock flight,
well, then i know I'm goingto the airport about three thirty ish
rush hour, not a good timeto be on the low Isle Expressway.
And if my flight's delayed an hour, now suddenly I'm taking off at seven
instead of six, and I'm landingat nine ten at night, and then
I'm getting it late, and thenI feel like I have to play catch
up with the meal I'm eating toolate, and with and with yeah,

(24:23):
and with going out and trying tobuy things that I'm going to be able
to supplement into my lifestyle for thenext few days that I couldn't travel with.
So I really think I'm choosing yourtime to day to travel. It's
strategic, yeah, yeah, andeven like I'll think of things like the
traffic to the airport, the trafficat the airport, I'm going to you

(24:44):
know what. And then also thething I've been doing lately is if I
have to do a stopover. I'mmaking sure that stopover is not too short,
because the last thing I want todo is like have a half hour
stopover and my plane's delayed and I'mstressed about and kept making the connecting flight,
and so I think I have likea ninety minute minimum for like,
I don't mind, I don't mindthem waiting. It's just I know,

(25:07):
I've been in situations where if thatconnecting flight is too tight, it's stressful,
dresses me out. Yeah, it'sstressful. I actually had to do
a few connections this past year.I had to do don Con in Mexico.
We had to connect in Mexico City, going to Whistler, you know,
we connecting Vancouver on Christmas Day,which is actually a really enjoyable connection

(25:33):
because we sat down, we hada fun little dinner and were able to
eat and actually I think going weconnected to Minneapolis and maybe coming back we
connected, you know, we Ithink it was Minneapolis actually, So yeah,
I mean I think, you know, just booking flights frivolously is something
I never do. I'll I alwayslook at all, right, well,
if there's one flight during the day, it is what it is like I

(25:55):
gotta you know, I gotta leaveat that time, and it is what
it is. But rarely do Ihave those options. Most of the time,
it's like, Okay, can Iget my training session in? Am
I going to hit rush hour traffic? What time am I going to get
in at night? Right? Whatam I going to have access to when
I get in? Do you everhave clients say like, we'll book your

(26:17):
flight and You're like, no,no, no, no, I'm going
to book my flight Like I've hadthat happen where they want to book it
and I'm like, no, no, no, I'm going to tell If
they do, I tell them exactlywhich flight I want right. But that
freaks me out too, because I'vehad some other people book my flights.
I'm like, really, like youhave me leaving it this time? And
no one, no one really,I mean they most of the companies I

(26:37):
work with. Other people are like, would you like to book your flights
and MELL reimburse you or whatever?It is like, yeah, absolutely,
I like that, Or if theyhave policy, they'll they'll say, can
you send us over the flights andwe'll book it for you and I'll get
sure, what airline do you like? To fly. I'm like, I
appreciate that, thank you. Here'smy frequent flyer miles. It's like there's
just certain things that you like todo. And also a funny thing too

(27:00):
is you sometimes fly into areas thatso I fly a decent amount. Like
I think, I don't know howyou actually break flights down. Do you
If I flew twenty times last year, is that twenty round trip flights?
Because then technically I was on fortyplanes, right, it's so, but
I'm flying probably once every no morethan once a month, right, Well

(27:22):
that's not true, once every threeweeks probably on average, it's coming.
I had about twenty round trip flightslast year, so yeah, it's probably
once every three weeks. Is themath on that? But yeah, I
think you know what I'll actually dosometimes is I know I have a trip
to Nashville, and I have wehave an appointment that Sunday that might end

(27:47):
early, so we have a lateflight booked. I'm even thinking about just
using my miles and booking an earlyflight just to have backup because those flights
go quick, and most people arelike, oh well, I don't want
to waste, so it's not wastingthe money. I have to book so
many flights and I'll just take thecredit and use it to another flight.
I'm just kind of front loading it. So sometimes I think that's a nice
little trick. Also, is thatif you know there's a possibility you can

(28:10):
get out. When I say earlier, I mean the difference between like five
or six pm and like seven am, like you pick up a whole day,
right, So be able to gethome to your family early, and
you feel a little bit more refreshand you know you can kind of So
those are little tricks also that youknow, if you don't mind like booking
those two flights on a day ina day, and when you find out
the day before, you can kindof cancel it or use it to book,

(28:32):
or use it to change, youknow, and book another flight at
another time. These are cool littlehacks that you can use where there's no
pressure. Right. It's because Iwas flying it from Vegas recently, and
I remember I thought I was goingto be on a I was supposed to
be on a red eye home fromVegas a couple of months ago. So

(28:55):
I went out, I went onthis podcast tour. I'm on like a
ten thirty or eleven o'clock flight homeand I'm like, oh, man,
leaving late at night. I knewmy podcast was going to end at like
two o'clock and there was a threethirty flight out of Vegas, so like
going on the trip, I knew. I was like, oh, I'm
not making that three thirty flight.And what happened was the podcast ended.

(29:18):
When I went to my last podcastappointment, I realized it was legitimately right
across the street from the airport,and I was like, oh my god,
that's like you need an hour.I have no all carry bags.
So what happened was is I gotout of the podcast at two ten.
I called an Uberg got to meat two twenty and I was like,
listen, head to the airport andI called up Delta and I'm like they

(29:42):
didn't have any flights a building.They were like one seats available, and
I'm like, can you move myevening flight to this? And the woman
was like yes, and I'm likehe does. So I was already on
my way to the airport, whichwasn't far. But I got out of
the car at two twenty five,two thirty and walk through security and I

(30:03):
was eating food at the gate atthree o'clock. I was even able to
get food. But it was justthinking that way and preparing in the future
and saying to myself, sit aroundall day and why am I going to,
you know, waste the entire afternoonand you know what, have to
deal with an overnight flight, whichis gonna beat me up. The reality

(30:26):
is is I took off at threethirty and I think was it a five
hour flight? So four thirty fivethirty sixty eight thirty, then you're another
three hours forward. So yeah,I landed at eleven thirty, but I
had checked bags, I had myride there. I was home at twelve
thirty one, showered in bed.A little bit different when you're waking up
the next day, Like the nextday, I'm waking up getting seven hours

(30:47):
of sleep, opposed to getting offa plane at six thirty in the morning
and feeling like complete crap, youknow, being in a car service coming
back. Who knows what goes onin the flight. And I almost felt
like I was able to pick upa half a day. Yeah, yeah,
doing that math is important. Here'sone for you. When you have
to travel, do you find thatyou're constantly like making adjustments of like Okay,

(31:12):
I'm gonna I gotta find a placeto work out, like and this
was the case here for me,like I gotta find a gym, I
gotta Yeah, what did you do? What did you where did you go?
Well, there was a here's thesituation. So the production company puts
some equipment in a couple of hotelrooms, right, and just it was
kind of bizarre and the equipment wasright, like there was one company that

(31:37):
they got their cardio equipment from andit wasn't Life Fitness, although they did
have a Life Fitness spin bike,but they had equipment from the place that
sounds like heck, no, whimright, I'll let you figure out who
it was, right, And itwas just horrible, like it just felt
horrible like and so we went foundanother gym locally and they had the same

(32:02):
like they're primarily outfitted with the samecompany, like they have a The place
was littered with that same company andwell that's common, that's common in Europe,
though they really have ye and sothere was like we did some there's
some freeway stuff and then there's likeplate loaded stuff that just felt odd.
Yeah, it just felt weird.And the benches were weird, like they

(32:23):
were too soft in spots and anyways, I found that was it was it
new equipment. It's relatively relatively guessand say techno gym, Yes, I
know it. No, it's ait's a big Italian brand in there and
listen very you know, expensive stuff. And yeah, I find with that

(32:45):
brand sometimes it feels really good,and then I feel with other equipment there's
just a big disconnect where you know, when I'm working with Life Fitness or
anything would perform better. It's likeeverything is just consistently good across the boards.
So I don't think it was missYeah, that's that's the thing about
likeness and Hamershik. There is nolike. There's no miss right, there's

(33:07):
and perform better. There is nomiss like. It's just but yeah,
I mean, you know stuff,it's it's sexy, it's appealing and a
lot of these people will you know, pay to you know, have that
in there. It's also a bigEuropean company. So yeah, so you
ended up finding so you found acouple of different facilities and you guys,
you guys pop around from facility tothe facility. Yeah, a little bit,

(33:27):
a little bit and he you know, there were some things he preferred
and some things he didn't. Right, So, you know, over two
weeks we found a few things thatworked out, and uh, but we
did a lot of stuff outdoors toobecause it was relatively nice, and a
lot we did a lot of likehigh paced walks and some some some running
stuff too. But so that's niceif you have somebody you can work with

(33:50):
and you can do that outdoor stuff. But certainly the gym stuff was,
like I said, it was justit was kind of hit and miss,
Like I didn't want to put himon something that he felt uncomfortable on,
you know, especially we had somepretty tight windows. It's like, okay,
we got to do four exercises,we're going to super set some things
back and forth, and just findingthe right piece of equipment that he felt

(34:12):
comfortable in was a little stressful.But did you guys find do you work
out in pockets? Do you likesay, hey, listen, we have
twenty minutes, we're gonna do somethinghere that we're gonna come back at two
o'clock and do another twenty minutes.Ere are you forcing in that position where
you have to do that or isthat something you guys don't do much in
this case. Yes, in thepast, but in this case he's in
every scene, in every shot forthis particular movie. So that's insane.

(34:37):
Yeah, right, And so weonly had mornings for the most part,
and sometimes we had a few evenings. But he was pretty beat up just
with the schedule, like twelve hourdays almost right, and you know,
rehearsal and even if you didn't haveto film, they had rehearsals and meetings

(34:57):
and script reads and all that.So it was it was pretty grueling.
So we were doing most of ourwork between like five thirty and six thirty,
five thirty seven in the morning.Yeah, which I like, I
prefer when I work with with anactor, you know, on set,
I prefer getting up earlier with themand getting it done. I just feel

(35:17):
like the evening there's too many variablesduring the day, and most of the
time they're way more tired at nightthan they are. Oh yeah, I
can't even believe. I mean,it's it's unbelievable how grueling some of their
schedules are. When you someone whodoesn't understand, I'm like, okay,
let's put you in front of acamera for one hour reading lines in front

(35:38):
of you know, forty fifty sixtypeople and you tell me how you feel.
And and also like sometimes I alwaysrefer to it as like having your
wires crossed right, Like sometimes I'mjust like I'm getting filmed for content.
I'm just like, oh my god, I don't have it today, or
my eyes look tired, or youjust feel like defeated, and you're like,
holy shit, like this is thisis going to be tough, but

(36:00):
you got to get out that content. But can you imagine doing that on
setting? You can't have You don'thave the opportunity to say, hey I
need a few hours or hey listen, not feeling good today. Can't come
in Like if your client turned aroundand was suddenly got the stomach bug and
I was like, oh man,I feel like getting stick today. Like
most people working at Goldman Sachs arelike, oh hey, I'm taking a

(36:21):
personal day to day. Like thesepeople can't. They're going into work.
They have to grin it out.No, And I'm sure I'm sure you've
been in the situation where like,you know, uh, hey he has
backspasms. I remember we were somewhereshooting and he had pretty bad backspasm and
I'm like, I don't think he'sgoing to be able to function, Like
this could get worse. And they'relike, we're spending five hundred grand a

(36:45):
day on this, like we can'tdelay, right, Like we have the
crew here, we have everybody here. And I'm like, okay, man,
yeah, I'm not a pet,but let's start playing with it and
let's start figuring it out. Yeah, listen, there's situations where you gotta
do what you gotta do and yougotta figure it out. And what's what's
cool about it is how you knowyou're I know who you're working with,

(37:07):
and I know what a big partof of all this that you are and
how you've helped that individual out.But yeah, it's it's tricky when you're
on the road and trying to findthat place and you know, like I
said earlier, you know, beingin the car and looking at you know,
door dash or Uber Eats or justsomething to try and supplement and get
some good nutrition to you. Doingthe same thing with Jim's I'm mapping out

(37:28):
how far is this gym, howfar is the ride going to be?
And listen, I have I've spokenat conferences where me and friends who have
been speaking with have gotten an uberrides for thirty minutes to get to a
gym. We were in Edmonton.It was a thirty minute uber ride and
we had time all morning, sowe went, you know, for the
uber ride, worked out there forhour, hour and a half, we
ubered it back and then you know, we were stopping get some breakfast and

(37:52):
then we're speaking in the afternoon.So that you kind of make it fun
and you make it a little bitof an activity. But sometimes you don't
have that type of time, andyou know, I don't know if you
have this issue, but I'm constantlystressed about the people working at the gym
and if they give us some issuesor the other patrons, right like,

(38:13):
just like can we get our workdone without being interrupted, disturbed or whatever
some sort of potential incident. That'swhy I loved owning my club in the
city. I mean, naturally,we don't have that problem out here,
but at the Club of the city, we had a policy. There's a
no phone policy, there was ano autograph policy, there was no picture
policy. And I remember a coupleof times I had to deal with a

(38:34):
hotel like a boutique hotel in thearea and they sent some people and I
look over in the corner there's awoman sitting there with her phone and she's
like this, and I had togo over and be like, listen,
do you a favorite? We don'trecord. She got really upset with me.
Came over. What's the meaning ofthis? And I'm like, she's
just recording so and so She's likedno, I wasn't. I'm like,
boot the phone and show me.I'm not pulling out the phone with her
husband said do me a favor.I said, I have cameras here.

(38:58):
You want to play this game?And he was like, I got it,
I got it, I got Igot understood. He got his wife
out of there. But you knowwhen you're when you're dealing with I had.
I had an actor getting ready forthis movie. I think it was
being shot in Upstate. He wasat a big box chain and he just
called me up after the first dayor two and he was like, I

(39:19):
can't do this, Like can yousend me some equipment doing sets? And
the people standing over me with thephone. I couldn't believe how believed it
was. He was giving me storiesof them, like people literally coming up
to them being like this is he'sdoing bicep curls and I'm like, oh,
that's terrible. So you know whatI sent. I sent a suspension
trainer. I sent him some powerblocks. I sent him some kettlebells from
perform Better. And it's like,okay, that's all. That's all you

(39:42):
could fit in your place. Youcan you have a room for uh you
know, we either use the suspensiontrainer off a door column. So you
know, I took it, tookthe vector thing as well, just in
case the vector resisted. Awesome,yeah, awesome, awesome. Yeah.
I think so vector is I thinkchecks those boxes right. And this isn't
a paid ad obviously, but it'slike they're when you're traveling and you don't

(40:07):
know or you're not one of thesepeople that are going to get in the
car and drive to a gym,I mean having this device and I'll actually
pull it out right now to youon here. It's actually pretty cool.
So they have two different sizes.I think it's pretty brilliant. They have
this travel size yeah yeah, sothis is the small one here that goes

(40:29):
in your carry bag, and thenthey have more of like your larger industrial
this fits at home, But thisright here goes in your backpack, and
you have one attachment here that there'salmost a line that can it's big enough
to wrap around a tree, orthere's a shorter one that could go into
your door column. And then hereyou can use a handle, you can
use a sin strap, you canuse a torso strap. And what's so

(40:52):
cool about is, look at this. You have your resistance. So if
I have my handle and I'm pullingor pushing or doing my ab work,
and I'm like, oh, that'seasy, one click and suddenly more attention.
Another click and suddenly more attention.So this is a beautiful Actually,
not to name drop, I usedthis with Amy Hathaway when she was shooting
a movie in London, you know, right after the pandemic, when everyone

(41:15):
was a little bit panicked to gooutside, and she had a just train
in her hotel room. And Ithought it was magical because now it took
body weight training up another level,Like there was so much stuff you could
do with body weight, but therewas so much you could do with squad
and pushing, pulling, chop work, dynamic rotational stuff, core work,

(41:38):
and it's just like, how easyis that so you don't have to carry,
you know, five hundred bands.You just suddenly have this. You
have this device at weighs five poundsand you could probably drive a car over
it's so sturdy. So yeah,those things there, those are little tools.
I always like to keep that inmy arsenal in case. You know
what, Once in a while,you're landing in it in area and you're

(42:00):
like, where's the closest gym andthey're like an hour. You're like,
oh my god, or what time'sa gym opening? And they're like eight
am, and you got to getthe work out it at five thirty six
o'clock. Prepare yourself. It's goodto be able to take something like this
and throw it in your bag,and if you're disciplined and you, you
know, are not wanting to takethat day off, or you are relying

(42:22):
on it as something that's really important. Actually, when I went and stayed
with Dru Powell in La I broughtthis out with me and I ended up
waking up every morning I wanted toexperiment with it, and I did a
ten to fifteen minute I called itactivation session. I still went to the
gym in the afternoon, but Iwanted to wake up after air travel and

(42:42):
do a series of movements that we'regoing to kind of allow my body to
floss a little bit, some rotationalmovement, some static hold movements, you
know, even some bounding. Iwas able to do some ballistics with it,
like getting my heart rate up foryou know ten, you know,
fifteen minutes max, getting in theshower, going having breakfast. I felt
like a different person. It isprobably the best I felt immediately when getting

(43:07):
off the plane because I felt likeevery morning I was able to just wake
up and activate and then go aboutmy day and then I was able to
get my training session and you knowlate that morning or later in the afternoon.
So these are little tools. Theseare little hacks that I recommend people
who are you know, when youtravel to Europe, you don't always have
access to good gyms like it's it'sit's difficult. Unfortunately, the gym quality

(43:29):
over there is not where it ishere, and the frequency of finding them
isn't so like this is. Youknow, I knew where I was staying
at this year, had it lastyear. I traveled with this because I
knew I was able to you know, get some work or even they had
this small, little universal area withdumb beels. I brought that down and
I was able to add and implementin so many different things. So these

(43:50):
are little things I think if you'regoing to, you know, travel,
What did we talk about today?We talked about hydration, We talked about
keeping the naps short. We talkedabout alcohol. We talked about keeping nutrition
high, making sure the foods we'reconsuming are nutritious, they're high in micronutrients,
not only about the macro, whichis your protein, carbs and fats,

(44:13):
micronutrients. You know, do youhave the vitamins and the minerals and
are you making that food powerful enoughto where you're making your immune system a
bit resilient. Grounding. We talkedabout grounding right walking around outside or even
if you're going to a warm spot, jumping in the water and swimming.
You know, immediately, I thinkit's one of my favorite things to do.
I mean, I almost feel likethat's a way to kind of get

(44:36):
your body connected and get get inthat nature and get in that natural sunlight.
I think that's all really helpful andmoving your body, I mean,
just something that's so important even whenyou're getting off a flight, Like,
think about you're just sat for five, six, steven eight hours, You're
tired, you're not feeling well.It's probably those times when most people are
like, I don't have the energyto do this. Just get up and

(44:59):
do something, even if it's foryou know, ten to fifteen minutes.
It's going to put yourself in amuch better place and you're going to be
more resilient, you know, whenyou focus on these things. Yeah,
I used that device daily too,just like you. It was almost like
a circuit that I just got intoa habit of doing right because I didn't
know if I was going to beable to get my work out in when
I was focusing on him or Andthen the other part of it was I

(45:23):
went on runs just so I couldsee the city, like yeah, beautiful,
right, So I just said,okay, well I'm going to go
over here. I got my GPSright, and I just said, okay,
let's go over there. And Iactually used running as a way to
kind of get an idea of whatthe layout of the city was. I
think that's brilliant. Again, Ithink it is important when you get off

(45:45):
these long planes, these long flights. I think it is important to change
your physiology a bit and push yourselfa bit and get yourself into some sort
of a training or movement environment whereyou know you are breaking your sweat,
you are little bit uncomfortable, You'llbe okay, right, It's like,
but I think doing that, youknow, right when you get off that

(46:05):
plane after you know, hydrating andeating and doing these things important. I
think it almost kind of helps toreset your clock a bit. Yeah.
No, that's a good that's agood name for it, reset, because
I think that's what I was doing. I'm like, Okay, I just
sat on a plane for freaking twelveand fourteen hours. I've got to make
up for that. I've got tolike get some fatigue into my system,

(46:28):
force some fatigue into my system sothat I can get back onto my sleep
schedule. Or knowing that beforehand,right, Like it's when you are,
you know, when you're when youhave a long flight home and you know
you have a long day home,and you know you're going to be limiting
yourself those steps. You know,maybe getting up and you know, if
you're in Europe and they don't haveaccess to a treadmill, maybe going for
an early morning run, right,to accumulate that movement a little bit more

(46:52):
and then almost set yourself up persuccess. You know, maybe you tire
yourself out a little bit more.So when you get on that plane,
you know the ender, she's notthat high, and you need to rest
a little bit more. You wantto rest a little bit more. So
these are ways that I'm thinking that. You know, if I'm on a
plane eight nine, ten hours,I am one hundred percent finding a time
during the day to train. Andif I'm flying over there, I'm always
leaving in the evening here, soI have time during the day. But

(47:15):
if I'm flying back, you know, we'll typically leave around twelve, one
o'clock whatever, I'm sorry, teno'clock in the morning, eleven o'clock in
the morning, and you're getting backin the afternoon because you're you're you're taking
back some time. So getting upearly and getting that moving in and getting
that sweat in, I think couldbe really helpful. That's true. I
was able to do that on bothends at a workout before. Yeah. Perfect