Should I Cut Weight For My First Competition?

BlogNutritionCoachingPowerliftingStrength training

5 Jan

Anytime anyone considers their first powerlifting competition one of the questions they are most plagued with early on is which weight class to enter. At a local level (which is what your first competition will be), the weight class you register for literally does not matter. IE, if I register for the 67.5kg weight class, but on the day I weigh in at 68.0kg, it bears no implication. I will simply be entered in to the weight class above (75kg).

But Billie, won’t you be less competitive in that weight class? Well yeah, but also, not important. Or at least, this is much less important than a stack of other factors that I consider in the context of a first competition.

So should I cut weight for my first competition? My answer to this question will almost always be no.

Here’s why.

You will never grow as much as you will in your first year of lifting. Do not rob yourself of gains here.

Newbie gains are real. You can gain so much muscle in your first year of lifting. You don’t even need a dedicated gaining phase. Simply eat enough to not lose weight and you can gain a stack of muscle early on. This has short term benefits of making you stronger immediately. But also, the earlier in your lifting career that you build muscle, the heavier you’ll be able to train earlier and the longer you’ll be able to train heavier, and your gains will be exponentially better for years to come.

To put yourself in a deficit early on in your lifting career is something you’ll likely come to regret. I have done this. So many of my peers have done this. Your early days of lifting are a developmental phase that you can never get back.

If you do stick around in this sport for any length of time (which for the sake of excellence, I hope that you do), it’s almost certain that in years from now you’ll grow in to a heavier weight class to reach your strength potential, and you’ll regret deeply that you hadn’t done it sooner.

You are so fucking anabolic when you first start lifting. Just let yourself grow.

Your first competition is such a valuable learning opportunity. Don’t take your focus away from learning.

I often say that the more you compete, the better you will get at competing. It’s one thing to get stronger; it’s another ball game entirely to become a better athlete. To be a good athlete you need to know:

The rules — you can be ultra strong, but if you don’t know the referee’s commands, or when to do your last warm up, or how to submit an attempt card, your strength is hardly going to be put to good use. Be attentive in your competition experiences so that you can learn what is going on around you and display your strength in accordance with the rules of powerlifting.
How to manage anxiety and arousal — this is one of the most significant factors affecting performance. You need to be able to get hyped when you need to be hyped, but not so hyped that you lose focus and panic. Manage your nerves. Get hyped enough to take yourself seriously. Balance those two. If you can master this, oh baby ❤️‍🔥
How to fuel yourself for performance — learning and implementing how to eat adequately year round, around training times, in the lead up to competition and on competition day. You’ll rob yourself of 90% of this experience and learning opportunity if you’re underfed on competition day. Learn how to eat to fuel your strength. This is a make or break. Learn it early.
Quality sportsmanship — sure this won’t affect your total, but it will affect the experience of everyone in the room around you, which is something you ought to care a lot about. Learn how to share the warm up room. Be respectful to fellow athletes, volunteers, referees and spectators. This is very worthy of your attention and effort. And your peers don’t deserve to deal with you hungry and grumpy.

Cutting weight on the morning of competition is a very all-consuming experience. Ask anyone who’s been there. Give yourself the best chance to be present on competition day by removing this unnecessary stressor. It just doesn’t need to be there.

Your first competition is not your most important. It’s just one brick in the path of your athletic career.

I actually say this about every competition: “your next competition is not your most important”. The more competitions that you do, the more your next competition will just get diluted among other competitive experiences. Over time, one individual sporting performance becomes less significant and instead, it just serves as piece of a larger puzzle of your entire lifting career.

When you’ve done 10 competitions and added 100kg to your total, will you really care in which weight class you registered a total in your first competition? Will you even remember? Over the last eight years I have competed across three weight classes. I don’t remember my total from most of my competitions. What I do know though is that my results have generally trended up as I’ve generally gotten stronger. The finer details are just minutiae.

So all of this is to say, if the results of your first competition are going to be diluted among your greater sporting career anyway, would it not serve you better to gain more muscle, learn the rules, learn how to manage your anxiety and arousal, learn how to fuel yourself and generally gather experience for future competitions — than to pour all of your efforts in to cutting down in the name of getting a slightly higher DOTS score in a competition you’re gonna forget the results of anyway?

Play the long game, my friend.

If you have fun, you’ll continue to show up and build your total.

Nothing is more important to your athletic success than consistency. And nothing is more important for your consistency than your continued enjoyment of the sport. Pool your efforts in to making your first competition the most fun possible. If you have a fantastic time on your first competition day, you’ll feel excited to compete again. And if you compete again you’ll continue training. And then you’ll gain more competitive experience and learn more about managing yourself as an athlete.

There is literally nothing more important in your first competition than having a great fucking time.

Cutting weight when you’re already full of competition day nerves and anxiety is absolutely not a great fucking time.

Bad combo. Just don’t.

Your first competition feels like the be all and end all when you’re in the thick of preparations. Of course, take yourself seriously and treat your sporting performance with the respect that it deserves. You pour a lot of time, effort and energy in to this sport and you deserve to show up for yourself.

But maintain perspective. Your first competition is just your entry point. Have fun, learn, light a fire in yourself for what is yet to come. This day is not the end; it’s just the beginning.

Anyway, enjoy some laughs at my expense from my first competition. May 2015. I did everything wrong. But I did have a great time.