Being the face of college football sounds glamorous. But that’s until you realize Kirk Herbstreit’s job description includes more miles than a Delta pilot. In just 96 hours, the ESPN veteran covered more airspace than most Americans do in a month. And just when it seemed he finally caught a break, ESPN’s travel gods threw him right back into the grinder.

On October 23, Kirk Herbstreit took to X and mapped out a week that’d make even the toughest road warrior wince. “Peter and I are covering over 4,400 miles this week. From Nashville to Los Angeles for @NFLonPrime as the @vikings take on the @chargers. Taking a redeye back home to Nashville for @CollegeGameDay on Saturday morning with @mizzoufootball and @vandyfootball, and then to Baton Rouge for @aggiefootball vs. @lsufootball on ABC,” he wrote. If that sounds exhausting, that’s because it is. Nashville to LA, 1,776 miles. Back home. Then off to Baton Rouge, another 469 miles. 

By the end of the week, Kirk Herbstreit will have crammed more airtime than most pilots rack up in training. This is a busy man. Thursday night, he has NFL duty with Al Michaels on Amazon Prime Video. Saturday morning, there’s College GameDay with Rece Davis and Desmond Howard. And Saturday night, ESPN’s primetime game alongside Chris Fowler. That’s survival. Yet somehow, he still shows up camera-ready with the same polished grin. 

Kirk Herbstreit’s balancing act isn’t new, but it’s starting to look superhuman. He often has to leave GameDay mid-show, hopping flights to wherever the ABC game of the week is. Like earlier this month, he bolted from Oregon mid-segment to catch Texas-Oklahoma in Dallas. “It’s almost like a mindset thing,” he told Men’s Journal. “If I did this in March, I probably would struggle. But when you just kind of shift a mindset into travel mode, it’s the expectation. You just do it. I’m not going to complain. The fact I get to do what I do for a living, I’m a pretty fortunate person. I’m not going to complain about the travel.” As if this week’s 4,400-mile dash wasn’t enough, previous weeks’ schedule made even seasoned travelers gasp for air.

Kirk Herbstreit is the ironman of broadcasting

To put it into perspective, Kirk Herbstreit traveled over 5,400 miles before last week alone. Between Amazon Prime, GameDay, and ABC, the ESPN analyst’s job makes the typical sports beat feel like a staycation. But last Saturday, he finally got the breather he deserves. With both College GameDay and the Georgia-Ole Miss game stationed in Athens, his broadcast worlds finally overlapped.

Even off-camera, Kirk Herbstreit’s grind doesn’t slow down. He teamed up with AT&T for its new “Clutch Calls” campaign, a fan-interaction series letting viewers send messages to players and coaches. Just another line on a resume that already reads like a playbook of commitment. Still, with ESPN squeezing every mile out of him, we got to admire his optimistic outlook and non-complaining nature. 

Because at this point, Kirk Herbstreit is living the game mile by mile, flight by flight, week after week. And somehow, he still manages to make it look effortless.