Keeping in shape on the road is one of the great elusive goals for business travelers. Every study or survey designed to profile the pitfalls of flying in cramped conditions, rushing to appointments, overeating with colleagues or customers, and rarely getting a normal night’s sleep has concluded that road behavior causes stress, adds pounds, and, frankly, sabotages the best-laid plans to maintain good health.

Gyms and Pools
But you can’t mumble excuses these days, now that hotels are making it easier to stay trim while traveling by providing sophisticated fitness facilities.

Responding to the workout revolution on the road, major chains such as Clarion, Crowne Plaza, Doubletree, Four Seasons, Hilton, Holiday Inns, Homewood Suites, Hyatt, Marriott, Red Lion, and Ritz-Carlton, all have fitness facilities in one form or another at more than 90% of their properties. And at last count, some 80% of hotels with more than 250 rooms now provide gyms, according to the American Hotel and Motel Association. 

Some of the facilities are top-notch. Gone are most of the aging contraptions, from obsolete stairclimbers and tired treamills that hotels tucked away in a scruffy exercise room that could have been used for storing luggage. Today, it’s bright lights, shiny mirrors, music videos, and rowing, chest-press, cardio, and other machines right out of the latest equipment catalog, aligned in military and muscular formation.   

The best of the hotels, mostly high-end establishments, now offer a full range of sleek, smartly engineered exercise equipment, coupled with a lap pool.

Spa Upgrades: Some chains such as Hyatt and Ritz-Carlton are pampering fitness fanatics by practically converting your guest room into a gym on request. At the push of a phone button you can order a stationary bike and other paraphernalia, plus fitness magazines and jogging trail maps, not to mention yoga and other exercise videos.

Hilton, for one, claims it has outdistanced its competition by making top-of-the-line treadmills available in guest rooms ($15) in about 150 of its North American hotels. Some of the participating hotels have “Get Fit with Hilton” rooms already equipped with fitness machines.   

Even more satisfying to business travelers starved for a sense of well-being while in transit, hotels have shifted into high gear in the past few years and invested big money in spas. That magic word—spa—takes fitness to a whole new level, wrapping workouts for the body and therapies for the mind into one rewarding package.

Expensive Exercise: The only cloud in this rosy picture is that you have to stay at first-class or luxury hotels to enjoy the full and glorious array of health-giving benefits. Guest rooms costing $200 to $450 a night are what we mean.

It’s a matter of economics. Only such Tiffany-like chains as the Four Seasons, Ritz-Carlton, and Mandarin Oriental have the resources, and inclination, to go all-out and build elaborate spas. Among the expensive roadblocks: you need treatment rooms for massages, the most popular single therapy, and fancy high-tech equipment for hydrotherapies, the next step up to health happiness.

Once inside these hotel palaces, you do have the free run of most of the fitness facilities. But if you go for spa treatments, be prepared to part with a lot of money in charges and tips.

The fact is, spas aren’t do-it-yourself oases. Most are staffed by freelance therapists who charge $50 to $80 or a lot more an hour for their services, just like doctors and mechanics. To which massage aficionados say, “It’s worth every penny.”

In the spa sweepstakes, count most boutique hotels out. (See list below for an exception.)  Though popular particularly with younger Gen-X business travelers, the chic properties created by uber-hotelier Ian Schrager such as the Royal in New York and copied by Starwood with its “W” brand devote more energy to stylish public spaces than to space-consuming health clubs and spas. It’s ironical that the two parallel trends—spas and boutiques—haven’t intersected much.

Diehard Discipline
In any case, think of working out in hotels with up-to-date facilities as a way of disciplining yourself—in effect, forcing yourself to face up to the necessity of keeping your body under control when your mind may be focused on a spreadsheet or a presentation. A little gentle punishment on a machine is a reminder that keeping healthy is no joke.

“Sometimes your travels help you recognize how humdrum your workout routine has become,” notes Suzanne Schlosberg, a contributing editor at Shape magazine, whose paperback, Fitness for Travelers: The Ultimate Workout Guide for the Road ($14), weighs less than the lightest free weight but packs a wallop in excellent user-friendly advice. “Although working out on the road may seem like a tall order, some of the world’s most frequent fliers manage to run, stretch, and lift weights away from home.”

You can also get good advice from the Web site of the American Council on Exercise (www.acefitness.org)—the nonprofit “workout watchdog” in San Diego that certifies fitness trainers and helped Schlosberg prepare her book.

High-end Hotels on a Health Kick

What follows is a list of upscale hotels in major business centers (from West Coast to East Cost) that provide above-average facilities for early-morning and after-work exercises and therapies.  For details, phone in advance (direct lines rather than 800 numbers listed) to find out whether they have just what you want or need. Your checklist should include what hours they’re open—many are closed overnight—and what specific types of equipment they have.

Los Angeles

Peninsula Beverly Hills, 310-551-2888, www.peninsula.com.  Movie stars and Hollywood executives and agents share the Arabian-nights rooftop pool and spa.

St. Regis, 310-277-6111, www.stregis.com.  Leave your Star Trek room and revel in the incredible spa or just laze on the pool deck with a view of Fox Studios.

San Diego

Four Seasons Aviara, 760-603-6800, www.fourseasons.com.  The Carlsbad resort isn’t on the ocean, but sports a super-spa plus super-golf.  

San Francisco

Four Seasons, 415-633-3000, www.fourseasons.com.  The Sports Club/LA chain manages the huge gym at this hotel newcomer on Market Street.       

Phoenix

Arizona Biltmore, 602-955-6600, www.arizonabiltmore.com.  Combine business and pleasure at this venerable in-town resort with a fine spa, glorious pools, and Frank Lloyd Wright touches.

Las Vegas

The Venetian, 702-414-1000, www.venetian.com.  Along with gondola rides along the faux Grand Canal, book a thermal-stone massage or loofah scrub at the Canyon Ranch-operated spa during your visit to a Vegas trade show.

Denver

Hotel Monaco, 303-296-1717, www.kimptongroup.com. The delightfully eccentric boutique hotel has found enough room for an on-site Aveda spa.

Dallas

Crescent Court, 214-871-3200, www.crescentcourt.com.  The spa in this rather jazzy hotel—built with old oil money—is so splendiferous that Vogue photographed its every detail at the opening.

Four Seasons at Las Colinas, 972-717-0700, www.fourseasons.com.  Every conceivable workout and sports facility is on the resort premises in the corporate enclave of Las Colinas in Irving.

Houston

Four Seasons, 713-650-1300, www.fourseasons.com.  Travelers doing business downtown in the nation’s oil capital rave about the gym and pool.

Houstonian, 713-680-2626, www.houstonian.com.  It’s an 18-acre fun-and-fitness oasis on the outskirts of Houston’s sprawl, with a loyal executive clientele.

New Orleans

Ritz-Carlton, 504-524-1331, www.ritzcarlton.com. Tear yourself away from the cabarets on Bourbon Street and dry out in the superior spa at this refurbished department store on Canal Street, the great divide between the French Quarter and everything else.

Chicago

Four Seasons, 312-280-8800, www.fourseasons.com. The skylit pool with Roman columns is the highlight of the fabulous spa at this luxe hotel on the Magnificent Mile.

Park Hyatt, 312-335-1234, www.parkhyatt.com.  The beautifully updated pleasure pad includes an outstanding gym. 

Peninsula, 312-337-2888, www.peninsula.com.  The spectacular newcomer’s 14,000-sq.-ft. fitness facility with a stunning view is a contender for “best spa on the Magnificent Mile.”

Minneapolis

Grand Hotel, 612-288-8888, www.grandhotelminneapolis.com. The former men’s club, converted to luxury hotel long ago, boasts a top health club and well-staffed spa where you can get a facial.

Atlanta

Ritz-Carlton Buckhead, 404-237-2700, www.ritzcarlton.com.  Guests heap praise on the health club at the hotel, now a business and social center in Atlanta’s upscale neighborhood.

Washington, D.C.

Four Seasons, 202-342-0444, www.fourseasons.com. The elegant executive hotel on the Georgetown border features a first-class fitness center and to-die spa.

Ritz-Carlton, 202-835-0500, www.ritzcarlton.com.  Weary travelers in search of a workout can break a sweat in the really neat gym run by the Sports Club/LA.

New York

Le Parker Meridien, 212-245-5000, www.parkermeridien.com. The full-service spa and rooftop pool with panoramic views are among the features that keep movie and music executives booking this well-located hotel on 57th Street.

Millennium U.N. Plaza, 212-758-1234, www.millennium-hotels.com.  A haven of diplomats and multinational execs, the hotel has (surprise) a good tennis court up top, plus a pool with skyline views.

Peninsula, 212-956-2888, www.peninsula.com.  The wonderful  tri-level, penthouse spa far above Fifth Avenue is visually surrounded by a gallery of eye-catching rooftops.

Phillips Club, 212-835-8800, www.phillipsclub.com.  The hotel and residential club, at Lincoln Center, has access to a convenient Reebok Sports Club.

Trump International Hotel & Tower, 212-299-1150, www.trumpintl.com.  The Donald’s New York hotel across from the new Time Warner Center and Central Park has a state-of-the-art spa and indoor lap pool.

Boston

Marriott Copley Plaza, 617-236-5800, www.marriott.com. The convention hotel is a winner because of the twin high-end shopping malls only steps away, variety of bistros (some with clam chowder and other Boston dishes), and a notably good health club.