How Dreak Davis’ new diet is helping him stay on the field

SOUTH CAROLINA GAMECOCKS FOOTBALL

Add wide receiver Randrecous Davis to the growing list of South Carolina players who have had their lives changed by team nutritionist Kristin Coggin.

"All of this injury stuff is kind of new to me," Davis said Monday. "I had to change my diet and the way I was living. I had to change all that."

Davis, a former four-star prospect who chose the Gamecocks over Georgia and Miami, got his first taste of a serious injury as a senior at Mays High School when he suffered a sports hernia, an injury that he played through and that slowed his start at South Carolina.

It's been one injury after another ever since.

Davis played some as a true freshman, catching three passes for 45 yards, but a hamstring injury cut that season short and forced a redshirt. Similar soft tissue injuries forced Davis to miss most of the following spring and fall in 2017 as well as the 2018 spring.

The 5-foot-10, 190-pound slot receiver saw time in each of the first six games last season before a finger injury forced him out for the rest of the season.

Enough was enough and Davis, now a redshirt junior, knew he had to make changes to his preparation. Healthier eating and better hydration can't fix tough-luck injuries like broken bones, but they can help to alleviate soft tissue issues like hamstring and groin pulls.

Davis and Coggins, the Gamecocks' nutritionist, have worked together to change his relationship with food.

"I love Kristin," Davis said. "She does a lot for us. Anything we need, we get, so it's kind of your fault if you're not on the right side of things right now."

While many struggle with eating too much, Davis' previous diet didn't feature enough food, and certainly not enough of the nutrition-dense foods that an elite athlete's body needs to thrive.

A typical day of eating in high school, Davis said, probably wasn't that different than any other teenager's with a lot of junk food and not near enough water.

His go-to meal, a package of hot fries with a can of Melon Brisk.

"I would have that for like a whole day and that would be it for me and I would pretty much eat that same thing throughout the day, and that was pretty much my meal," Davis said. "Now I have to actually eat breakfast and eat eggs and she makes sure I get my carbs and my vegetables and all that. I really like her, she's a big help."

A self-proclaimed picky eater, Davis is still learning what type of nutritious foods he likes, and says he's not big on seafood or steak but that chicken has become a regular part of his daily diet.

He's also gone from barely drinking water during the day to "now I'm drinking, like, gallons, daily."

"It's very, very, very hard," Davis said of changing his entire relationship with food. "I'm a very picky eater, like I don't eat a lot of things, just being able to switch your mindset, you have to change everything. Change is hard, period, so just doing all that, it wasn't easy. And I'm still now there yet, but I'm definitely taking steps in the right direction."

While it's an ongoing process, Davis has come a long way from his days of eating vending machine food at school.

He's even researched other diets including that of Cam Newton, who reportedly gave up red meat. Davis was involved with the Cam Newton Foundation in high school and says he's looked into veganism, though he's still deciding if it's for him: "I kind of want to try it, but I dunno that might be a little reach," he says with a smile.

Regardless of what decision he ultimately makes there, Davis has already seen the fruits of his new eating habits paying off on the field.

"It's definitely a big difference, the amount of energy I have now," Davis said. "Usually, I would get up and I wouldn't have as much energy and I wasn't able to go as fast. When you eat your veggies, it helps your body wake up, like you're up all the time."

Most importanltly, this spring marks the healthiest he's been since arriving in Columbia and his first opportunity to go through a full offseason fully healthy.

The redshirt junior, who has taken reps with the first team at the slot receiver spot, knows his opportunities are quickly running out and has grown tired of watching from the sidelines due to injuries.

"Everybody wants to play and everybody has to compete and you have to compete to win your job," Davis says. "If I'm not competing or I'm not eating right or not able to get my body right, then I won't be able to get that position. But this is definitely my chance. I've definitely got a chance and I'm going out for it."