Q: Hey Tate, thanks for taking a few minutes of your time to answer some questions! We hope you had an amazing time competing at the Winter WODfest competition. What was your perspective on how the event went?
Tate: Winter WODfest was a blast, as always! Chris and Lindsey Marcelli put together some very challenging events and made sure all the athletes had an incredible weekend. I gave it my all and did my best...landed in the middle of the pack of the Rx Women after the first couple events, but by the last event of Day 1, my weaknesses gave way to losing some ground. Being that Day 2 involved swimming, I was able to use some of my strengths to climb back up 5 spots, but still didn't finish where I wanted to.
Q: Is there anything you wish you had done differently?
Tate: Hands down, I wish I had been able to train 5-6 days/week, but due to a prolonged illness and lack of time, I was only training 2 days/week for a few months leading up to the weekend of the competition. Most of the movements were set in my muscle memory, but my endurance was severely lacking.
Q: What does your training normally look like leading up to a competition?
Tate: Normally I spend 4-6 days training hard each week for months ahead of time, working on each of the different weightlifting movements, body-weight movements, gymnastics skills and metabolic conditioning. Then the last two weeks before the competition, knowing that my performance capability is basically set, I focus specifically on what the competition events will be and do a little skill-fine-tuning. The week of the competition, I will taper by doing a normal WOD Monday and Tuesday, a half-WOD Wednesday, active recovery Thursday and then full rest Friday.
Q: Do you have a strict nutrition/supplementation plan you incorporate into your competition prep?
Tate: As with the majority of my day-to-day nutrition/supplementation, I eat clean (AKA mostly Paleo) and take my supplements--Fish Oil, Performance Multivitamins, Peak ATP, BetaTOR and amino acids. The week before the comp, I clean it up where I need to so that I don't have any extra inflammation, but I also fuel up on a little more of my healthy carbs with brown rice and sweet potatoes. I also like to incorporate more beet juice for a few days prior to enhance my recovery the weekend of the competition.
Q: What’s next on the agenda for competitions?
Tate: Next on the agenda is focusing on the CrossFit Open (which begins in less than a month) in hopes of making progress toward my 2017 goal of qualifying for the Masters Regionals. I will most likely seek out a few local competitions as well because they're always so much fun and help me keep my head in the game.
Q: Have you set any specific goals for 2016? And what is your plan to accomplish those goals?
Tate: My specific goals for 2016 are to increase each of my lifts by at least 5 pounds, get my butterfly pull-ups and linked muscle-ups back (which have been "lost" ever since an injury almost 2 years ago), and improve my endurance/VO2 Max. My plan is to get back in the box and work on my lifts and my skills each week with the help of accomplished coaches, as well as apply the results of my Active Metabolic Assessment (done at Lifetime Fitness) with a specific metabolic coaching plan. Beyond that, it's a matter of staying mentally tough because weekends like last weekend at the Winter WODfest can be discouraging when you're broadsided with the harsh reality that you are NOT where you want to be. I am going to dig deep, train hard and keep pressing on!
Thank you, Metabolic Technologies (developers of the patented ingredients HMB and BetaTOR), for allowing me to share this incredible journey and for supporting me along the way.
Thanks Tate for talking with us and we are very proud to have you on our team! We wish you the best in reaching your goals this year!