Preparing for a competition, can be difficult, check out this blog on how you can achieve your best results while competing.
If you are competing in a competition or race you have most likely trained for it, if not you will need to start.
When training you will need to make sure you balance your recovery, sleep, nutrition and your exercising. These are four very important factors of a healthy lifestyle. Check out a blog on how you can balance your life, here!
When should I start training?
You should start training as soon as you can. If your race or competition is a long time away, you may only need to be doing light exercises and not heavy training. If you start training too early you may not be able to keep it up until your competition.
2-3 weeks before an event you should be training at a high intensity, when you train at a high intensity it is very important you fuel and refuel your body correctly. You should also make sure you are keeping clean, not sharing any food or water as your immune system is low when you train at a high intensity.
Keeping clean is vital when preparing for a competition.
The week before your competition you should begin to taper your training so you do not injure yourself before the event. This will also allow your body to collect and store carbohydrates to use for your race/competition.
What do I need to eat when preparing for a competition?
Each competition and sport will be different but you will need to have a look at the following.
- Meal sizes
- Number of meals
- Macronutrient breakdown
- Fast/slow burning foods
- Meal timing
I will be discussing all of this and more in this blog, so make sure you keep reading!
Check out the infographic below from Precision Nutrition, as you can see this shows you how you should be measuring each macronutrient serving.
This is a quick and easy to read infographic of how much is in a portion of each macronutrient and your vegetables!
Before a competition you will want to be fuelled as best as you can, to achieve your best results.
Your two main aims before a competition are to:
- Fill muscle and liver glycogen stores.
- Keep well hydrated.
If you can achieve these two, you will be well on your way to achieving your best results!
Meal sizes:
Your meals should be relatively large, depending on what sort of competition you are competing in.
For a run, cycle or any other cardio based competition you will want a large amount of carbohydrate on your plate, increasing your meal size slightly.
Competition such as weight lifting you will need to balance your meals, meaning you will need a moderate amount of carbohydrates, you should have some protein too! You will want a moderate amount of carbohydrates so your body does not break down the protein in your muscles for energy.
Number of meals:
If you have increased your meal sizes already you may not need to add more meals to your day. You will need to increase your calories. You can eat more meals, with less in each meal or less meals with more food in each meal.
Nutrition for heavy training session.
Make sure you are well hydrated, and have water with you.
If you are training at a high intensity your body will more than likely sweat and release fluids. You will want to have water to replenish the fluids lost.
Before:
If you are training in an endurance manner, meaning your training session will be on for more than 90 mins at a steady pace (E.G running), you will want to have a carbohydrate rich meal 1-2 hours before your training, this hour will allow your body to start digesting the food and you will be able to use it as energy when training.
During:
You should also have some sort of food or carbohydrate drink during your training session if it goes on for more than 90 minutes. Carbohydrate drinks come in small sachets which are rich in carbohydrates. This will help your body train for longer and keep your pace up.
After:
You will need to have some sort of recovery snack or meal. Ideally your snack/meal should be rich in carbohydrates to replenish glycogen stores and also contain some protein for muscle protein synthesis. You should also replenish any electrolytes lost. A very small amount of salt in your water will help replenish any sodium lost!
If you are competing in a race such as running or cycling, you will not need as much fats in your diet, this is because fats are a slow burning fuel. You use the majority of fats when you are resting or sleeping.
If you are competing in a weight lifting competition you should include a small amount of fats when preparing for competition, like everyone!
Everyone will need to include fats in their diet.
Before your competition.
3-4 days before your competition you will need to increase your carbohydrate intake.
These last few days before your race are vital, you shouldn’t skip any meals!
This is your last chance to make sure you are prepared for your competition as best as you can.
The day before your competition you should be:
- Eating complex carbohydrates
- Plenty of fluids
- Avoid high fatty foods or oily foods
- Avoid alcohol
The day of your competition:
You may feel some nerves before your competition and this is normal, signs of pre-competition nerves are:
- Reduced appetite
- Nausea
- Diarrhea
- Stomach cramps
If you feel you cannot eat or you have a reduced appetite you should try having the following foods.
- Porridge
- Yogurt
- Fruit smoothies
- Custard
- Pureed fruit
These foods are easy to consume and easy to digest as well, if you are feeling hungry before a competition try to drink some water first. Water helps to break down food and turn it into energy.
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If you still have a question or have another topic you would like to see a blog about, drop me an email at, support@nutravice.com