Opening the book…
Withheld praise is a small lie, and small lies about other people's quality eventually corrupt your read on your own. Saying it out loud costs you nothing real and forces you to look clearly at what they actually did. It also drains the resentment that turns competition into something ugly.
When a competitor pulls off something excellent, tell them or tell the room within the day — specific about what was good, not a vague nod. No qualifier attached, no 'but' clause, no waiting until you have won something to balance the ledger. If you cannot name what was good, you haven't looked hard enough yet.
Don't praise work that isn't good to seem gracious; hollow compliments are worse than silence. And if the win came through cheating or cruelty, name that instead.