What Should You Eat Before Your Next CrossFit Competition?

While nutrition is essential during your training period, it’s a necessary part of successfully getting through the CrossFit competition day. It can affect your performance, mood and even set you on the right post-competition recuperation path. With all those food options, one might quickly get confused about what to eat before the next CrossFit competition. Do you stick to your usual regimen? Do you make any changes? Is there something specific you should know about food choices before and on the competition day?

To help you out, we’ve put together a list of easy-to-follow instructions. Let’s see what your menu should look like if you want to step up your game for the next CrossFit competition.

What You Should Eat Months Before the Event

You are months away from your next big CrossFit event. There’s no need to cut down on your exercises nor your nutrition. That’s a perfect time to identify the areas you can improve with your exercise. That calls for proper and well-balanced nutrition rich in fibers, protein, and healthy fats. Remember that you’ll need to stick to your exercise regimen while caring that you are calorie sufficient if you want to bulk up. You can continue with your regular diet. However, you should consider a few tweaks.

Since you are preparing for your big day, you will probably step up your exercises, increase weights, and several repetitions. A healthy diet can help you reduce inflammation and stick to your schedule. Make sure one-third of your meal is lean protein and two-thirds are healthy carbs (fruits with low glycemic index and non-starchy vegetables). Add healthy monounsaturated fats to your meals. You can find them in avocados, nuts and olive oil.

What You Should Eat During a Week Before the Event

With the event date closing in, make some tweaks to your diet. Most of the CrossFit enthusiasts cut down on the exercises. They know that the week before the event isn’t going to change a lot in their performance. Instead, they focus on mobility exercises to improve strength and range of motion and get their bodies ready for the competition day’s stress. You should continue with your diet routine. However, make sure to eat balanced and keep that calorie surplus in check. You don’t want to start building fat.

Your diet should promote healthy sleep as you will need your body to be fully rested before the competition. Introducing fatty fish to your diet is a good idea as it promotes better sleep and contains omega-3, which can help reduce inflammation.

What You Should Eat Day Before the Event

The sun is up, and you find yourself enjoying the morning on a day before the competition. It’s time to start packing some energy for the day ahead. You can stick to your routine meals with one exception. CrossFit competitions are strenuous, and you will need all the energy you can get.

Focus on adding low-glycemic carbs to your meals to enhance glucose stores in your muscles. High-intensity activity such as CrossFit burns a lot of energy. Having excess glycogen stored in your muscles and liver will help you maintain performance levels through the competition day.

Where do you find these slow-release carbs? Non-starchy vegetables are rich with them, including tomatoes, broccoli, spinach, kale, cucumber, asparagus, and cauliflower. You can also eat oats, quinoa, and sweet potato to store extra glycogen in your body.

Your last meal before going to bed should contain proteins, healthy fats, and slow-release carbs, and at the same time, it should promote healthy sleep. Moreover, consider eating fish such as salmon for your dinner because it is rich in proteins and omega-3, sweet potatoes, and salad made of non-starchy vegetables.

For athletes seeking plant-based omega-3 alternatives, exploring vegan options through resources like Performance Lab’s review can provide valuable insights into top omega 3 supplements rich in essential DHA and EPA, supporting muscle, joint health, and recovery for maintaining peak performance.

What You Should Eat on CrossFit Competition Day

On the day of the competition, you should eat your usual breakfast. It should be at least one and a half or two hours before the first event. The protein and carbohydrate servings will depend on your body size and weight.

Usually, the protein serving ranges from 10 to 40g, and carbohydrates from 30 to 56g per meal. Don’t forget the healthy fats as a well-balanced pre-competition meal can help enhance your performance.

Bring small snacks with you – ones that don’t have to be refrigerated. These include bananas, protein bars, chicken and rice, or baby food. You must replenish your energy after each workout of the day (WOD). It will give you enough time to get the food down before you need to compete in the next WOD.

Conclusion

Hopefully, this information will help you optimize your diet for the CrossFit competition. One last thing to remember is to hydrate. Water is an essential part of your diet. You should drink at least 2 liters of water per day. If you take coffee as a booster, you’ll need to take an extra liter of water to cushion its diuretic effect.