Over my 10+ years of competition tanning, I’ve worked with some not so great products and landed in hospital with an allergic reaction, seen athletes look like zebras as they’re tanned right before heading on stage, seen athletes white because the tanner ran out of time and didn’t tan them at all, some golden athletes the Oscars would love to have on their trophies, then seen some green tans the hulk would be dam proud of!
There are so many variables to the tanning process and every tanner has a different process. No ones process is wrong, just different in their application. Some base Thursday, some Friday. How good we make you athletes look at the end of the day is our main objective, especially after the months of blood, sweat and tears…..all we do is bloody sweat while tanning.
Some things that spring to mind…when we say shower before coming in and NO DEODORANT etc as your tanning prep, that means no deodorant. When we start tanning you and your armpits turn green, then we ask you if you followed prep instructions re NO DEODORANT ‘no’ with a sheepish look or ‘not since this morning’ can be a little frustrating. Please follow the prep instructions as they are given for a reason. On the plus side, you know your deodorant works fantastically and lasts a long time.
Sleeping with your tan….we all love our partners (those that have partners bless) please remember to sleep with loose clothes on. I’ve had athletes turn up that have spooned. She had a hand print on her right breast and her butt cheeks were white. His thighs, groin and some of his abs were white, plus a brown hand.
Toilet seats…toilet seats on comp day are basically a NO GO ZONE FOR SITTING. I can’t emphasise that enough really, please squat over the toilet as you can guarantee someone will have peed a little on the seat. Its worse if the toilet seat has been glad wrapped. Being in the carb depleted, dehydrated state that most of you are in, you wont be thinking about wiping the toilet seat before sitting down. Its after these moments that i see panicked athletes run out of the toilet with a white toilet seat mark missing from their tan needing to be fixed when I’m on site. An alternative is to buy a she-wee, or use paper cups and punch a pencil through the centre of it. That way ladies you wont have pee dribble marks down the inside of your legs to fix up.
Base tans…when you are organising your own base tan and having only a top coat with the on site tanner, please make sure you are having it done with a competition tanner. They need to know how to tan correctly with comp products, know your category colour needed, and be comfortable to tan you without clothing on if needed. It can be difficult for us tanners to make you black in the time allotted to you on comp day. I’ve had athletes turn up looking pasty white saying they had their base tan the night before or even 2 days before, and have then showered a couple of times and wonder why they are alot fairer than the other athletes back stage. We’ll be expecting someone with a competition base tan not a holiday tan, and this can mean you looking lighter than your competitors on stage….food for thought…mmmmm…food.
Manicures and pedicures…..please think about what you are booking in for after your tanning. Always an interesting one when the tanning has been done, then I receive a panic call saying some of an athletes tan is missing because they forgot about their tan until they noticed the lady massaging their leg up to the knee after their feet etc had been soaking in water for 10-15mins. If you really cant get these done until just before the comp, get the express treatments done which dont include soaking.
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