Author: competesc

Nutrition 

Everything You Need to Know about BCAAs

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Recently I have noticed a trend on health/fitness accounts on social media. For whatever reason, in the past few weeks everyone has been bashing BCAAs. If I spend 2 minutes on the “Explore” page of Instagram, I will find at least 10 posts explaining (entirely unscientifically) why BCAAs are a waste of money and do nothing for you. In this post, I am going to refute these claims, and defend BCAAs as a performance supplement. If you want to geek out on science with me, read the whole post. If you don’t care about that and just want some answers, skip to the last paragraph right now.   In this post, I’m going to start by explaining what BCAAs are, outline why they are important, and offer recommendations on when/how to use them.   Step 1 – What are BCAAs?   BCAA stands for “Branched Chain Amino Acids” of which

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Nutrition 

How to Meal Prep: Your 3 Step Guide

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         ->          Knowing how to efficiently meal prep is one of the most important skills a health-conscious person can learn. Whether you’re a 16 year old athlete trying to get stronger and improve performance or a 40 year woman trying to lose some body fat to get ready for beach season…YOU NEED TO LEARN HOW TO MEAL PREP.  The whole point of this article (and video) is to show you how easy meal prep can be and the benefits you can reap. Click here for the “HOW-TO Meal Prep” Video Guide. Let’s put a nutritious spin on one of my favorite quotes from Ben Franklin: “Early to bed. Early to rise. [MEAL PREP] makes a man Healthy, Wealthy, & Wise.”  The benefits are too great to ignore: HEALTHY: Keeps you on track to your nutritional goals. Hard to sneak in cheat meals when

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Training 

In-Season Training

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Related Post: In-Season Nutrition > 4 Reasons Why Your Performance will Decline and how to Prevent it In-Season Training Guide Strength training, tissue care, and quality nutrition can be difficult paths to navigate while competing in a sport. By the end of the season, most athletes lose up to 10 lbs of lean muscle mass, gain 2-3% body fat, and lose upwards of 20% of strength /power output. Athletes re-enter the weight room after 3 months of competition and start their off-season training back at square one.  Why bust your ass in the weight room 6-9 months out of the year if you’re going to lose what you’ve worked so hard to gain during the season?  This is what I call the “Yo-Yo” training effect.  After working hard to make gains in lean muscle, strength, power, speed, and overall athleticism during the off-season, an athlete stops training to focus on competing. During that

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Nutrition Productivity Training 

Combating Adversity: 3 Practical Ways to Increase Resiliency

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“It is precisely in times of immunity from care that the soul should toughen itself beforehand for occasions of greater stress, and it is while Fortune is kind that it should fortify itself against her violence. In days of peace the soldier performs manoeuvres, throws up earthworks with no enemy in sight, and wearies himself by gratuitous toil, in order that he may be equal to unavoidable toil” – Seneca the Younger   How do you handle adversity? When real hardships come up in your life, do you feel like you can remain calm, cool, and collected, or do you typically hit the panic button? If you’re anything like me, your first instinct is likely to drop everything, freak out, and then curl up in a ball and feel sorry for yourself for a few days. This type of reaction can manifest itself as anxiety, over-thinking, lack of action, etc.

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Nutrition 

3 Tips for Boosting Immune Health

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If you’re reading this post chances are you are sick or have been sick in the past month. The number of people complaining of various ailments this winter has been staggering. Throughout it all, however, I have noticed an uncomfortable trend. While going over food journals, I see 2-4 days in a row with horrible nutrition and sleep protocols, coupled with an asterisk and “I was sick.”   I began to realize, people have no idea how to be sick.   Here’s what I mean: when you are feeling under the weather, it is time to button up all sleep and nutrition habits, NOT let them all crash down. Poor nutrition, sleep, and hydration suppress your immune system.   The reason we preach proper nutrition, sleep, and hydration to our athletes is because that is how our body recovers from stressors. Working out is a stressor, recovering from that allows

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Productivity Training 

5 Books Every Athlete, Coach, and Leader Should Read (2017 Edition)

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If you influence just one single person, YOU, my friend, are a leader.  Like it or not, somewhere someone is looking up to you as role model. This is something we should all take a very seriously because having influence is having power and having power means we have the ability to create a positive change in the people around us. This change can be exponential if we are impacting the right people at the right times. The following books have helped me become a better leader, employer, coach, and role model. If you choose to pick up any of the following books please remember, to paraphrase a quote borrowed from Legacy, better people make better leaders. We must work on improving and elevating ourselves if we plan on elevating others.  There is no greater responsibility and privilege in the world than leading other people.. iron sharpens iron.   5)

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Productivity 

Creating Success Through Self-Auditing

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        One of the fundamental tenants of Compete SC is our goal of making every person who steps through our doors better. On the surface, we are primarily making those that enter better at sports, or simply getting them in better shape.   I would be lying, however, if I said we didn’t have a secondary goal of personal growth and development with all our athletes and adult training clients. We try our best to not only produce great athletes, but to produce great people as well.   A few months back, I wrote an article on my personal meditation practice. I was pleased when I heard a few people say they liked it, received a couple emails thanking me for writing it, and even had some people say they tried the meditation method I suggested and liked it. Even though it was only a few people, I

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Nutrition Productivity 

Vitamin D: 5 Things You Need to Know

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“Vitamin D isn’t just the most important supplement, it’s probably the most important biohack from the world of anti-aging and human performance.”— Dave Asprey Vitamin D provides energy, decreases the chance of long term health risks, increases overall daily performance, and most importantly, optimizes quality of life. I know many people who have significantly changed their lives by beginning to supplement Vitamin D. I have witnessed close friends demolish anxiety disorders, breathe life into under-active libidos, lose 30+ pounds of fat, and even eliminate the mid-afternoon “brain fog” by adding this awesome supplement to their daily routines.

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