Mike Bewley, founder of Critical Reload, specialist in sports nutrition and former NCAA DI strength coach, shares his journey into the nutrition business, sparked by frustration with NCAA regulations and the lack of scientific research on sports nutrition. He underscores the critical role of proper nutrition for athletes, including the need for an insulin reaction to infuse muscles with growth-promoting proteins and provide energy.

Bewley notes that many athletes are undernourished and overworked, and that nutrition plays a significant role in their development. While he no longer coaches, he continues to consult on sports nutrition, deriving satisfaction from helping coaches who, in turn, assist athletes. Bewley also discusses the rewarding aspect of supporting someone in achieving his or her goals, describing it as an irreplaceable feeling. Watch this video to learn about the importance of nutrition in sports and the rewarding journey of helping others achieve their goals.

Critical Reload was founded by former Director of Basketball Strength & Conditioning Coach and Specialist in Sports Nutrition for Clemson University Mike Bewley. In 2002, Bewley earned his certification as a certified specialist in sports nutrition through the International Sports Science Association. Since that time, Coach Bewley has accumulated extensive experience assisting athletes with their performance nutrition needs while founding Critical Reload in 2004.

His proficiencies as a specialist in sports nutrition include:

• Recognize nutritional factors affecting health and performance that will enable appropriate nutritional counseling with Director of Sports Nutrition for Olympic Sports.
• Disseminate factual knowledge of performance enhancing substances and provide persuasive evidence to student-athletes as the effects, risks, and appropriate alternatives.
• Measure and monitor athlete and team body composition.
• Analyze nutritional habits of athletes to determine the steps necessary to modify and provide a balanced diet.
• Coordinate meal planning for at home and in-season travel.
• Serve as liaison between athletics department and food services to oversee all facets of training table nutrition and scheduling.
• Founded Critical Reload App (formally called NutraCarina), an intuitive on-line platform that seamlessly combines the nation’s top specialists in sports nutrition and sport dietitians with cutting edge technology.
• Utilize smart phone technology to monitor nutritional habits of athletes for dietary exploration, education, and application.
• Use product hardware and software to formulate daily caloric expenditure to estimate training table/travel menus, appropriate individual hydration requirements and enhance exercise recovery.
• All the above nutritional practices virtually eliminate in-season weight-loss while helping enhance performance development year-round.

Furthermore, Bewley has been a Division-I collegiate strength and conditioning coach since 1998 making stops at University of Nevada-Reno (1998-2002), Georgia Southern University (2002-2006), University of Dayton (2006-2012), Georgia Tech (2012-2016) and Clemson University (2016 to present).