I'm finally at a point where I travel significantly amount for work so I'm trying to maximize my trips. I've tried to look up as much info to this effect as I can but wanted to run my scenario by you experts.

I'm in Santa Rosa, CA until at least mid-April. I chose the Courtyard Mariott over the Hyatt across the street after reading program comparisons on the board...I also go to Vegas several times a year and figured I could use the points for Cosmo stays.

As of when I check out on Friday (02/20/15), I'll have 31 nights this year on two stays (this current stay will be 26 nights consecutive). I started the year with zero status. During this long stay, I've had them hard post the week to my account each Sunday for expensing purposes so even though I currently only have 5 nights posted to my account, I was able to call MR cust service and get them to bump me to Silver. I understand that the hard post does not count as a stay but I wanted to at least start getting the silver points bonus.

I've already signed up for MegaBonus.

I am waiting on contracts for 4 seperate "meetings" at $75 (+ tax) each to get an additional 40 nights (10 nights per meeting). I'll do 2 meetings this week and 2 next. I chose to do this so I could get to Platinum faster and get the extra bonus points for my remaining actual nights.

Based on my time here between now and mid April, I'll accumulate at least 40 more nights staying at the hotel (probably about 5-7 stays for those nights). Probably more if I stay here for some weekends but I'll be flying back home more to close out my time here so at minimum I'll get at least 40 more.

Taking that all into account, I'll have at least 111 nights (31 + 40 from meetings + 40 more from nights in the hotel) by the end of April.

My question is what else can I do to maximize my time and points here?

I'm not interested in the credit card option. I usually book all of my rooms with the front desk because they will book me even if the website shows sold out but if I could keep the same rate by doing it online via one of the cash back rebate sites, I'd consider that route.

Would it be beneficial for me to do a Gold Challenge starting with my stay this coming Sunday (02/22/15) when I check back in? My thought is bumping up to Gold faster would allow me to take advantage of those bonus pts sooner and then from there, push on to Platinum. Or should I just wait since, in theory, I should be gold after the 10 nights per meeting post following my 4 meetings?

Anything you can think of that would allow me to garner as many pts (or are stays better?) as possible would be more than welcomed. Thanks for reading and willingness to help.