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Good question, and one for which the jury really is out (PUN intended), or let’s say opinions vary a lot.
If you feel strongly about an image’s competition potential, here are 2 reasons for keeping it under wraps:
1/ It will feel “seen before” if jury members happen to stumble upon it, say on your social media. Now the question is, how likely is that to happen, and if it does happen, how important is it? Not so much for contests which happily award previously awarded images, but you’ll find that big contests tend to prefer novel images.
2/ Say your photo uses an innovative technique, or applies/adapts an existing technique to a new subject. Sometimes the challenge is getting the idea, rather than executing it. For that sort of image, you may want to refrain from sharing that idea early, and finding several other photographers emulating it and entering their shot in the same contest => less uniqueness.