So what exactly is sports massage? Many people envision it as a therapy only appropriate for elite athletes of a certain age, and most people also envision pain as part of the treatment. Nothing could be further from the truth.
So who is sports massage suitable for? The name does suggest that it’s only suitable for those that play sports – but in actual fact sports massage is suitable for anyone, regardless of the level of activity.
Sports massage is an effective treatment modality for soft tissue injuries, regardless of how these were sustained. It can also form part of an aspiring or devoted athlete’s strategy to prevent injury. In my experience I find that sports massage is particularly useful in the case of those that lead a lifestyle that isn’t as active as they would like and they are looking to increase their level of activity. Starting to train for a specific run, race or simply starting to go to the gym regularly can take its toll on muscles that are unaccustomed to working so hard and can put a real dampener on keeping up with the training. In fact a significant amount of first time gym goers find themselves skipping the gym because they’ve got muscle pain – usually something as simple as DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness), or pain resulting from muscle imbalances during exercising.
Another sports massage myth is that it has to hurt. This is simply not the case. Pain is not always gain. Some patients prefer their soft tissue work to be very deep (which could cause pain), whereas others will prefer the more superficial soft tissue massage. Any skilled massage therapist will adapt their technique to suit the patient’s needs and preferences.
Fundamentally sports massage seeks to work with both superficial and deep body tissues, as appropriate. Often neurophysiological mechanisms are sought to be affected, in cases of muscle energy techniques (which makes a stretch very effective) and other techniques such as trigger pointing, where hyper-sensitised areas of tissue are stimulated with a view to desensitise them and restore normal function. In some patients/clients we seek to bring about functional changes in the recruitment of the muscular system (often affecting the vascular and lymphatic systems) with a view to reduce pain and improve performance.
Of course athletes of all types are welcome. Whether your life is solely preoccupied with sport, or you work during the week but are getting ready for a charity 10K run or bicycle race – I’ve had experience delivering pre-event massages as well as post-event recovery massages to sports players of varying ages.
One of the benefits of having sports massage with me is that I’m also an osteopath, which means that if a problem has a deeper cause I may be able to treat this osteopathically or even refer to or suggest a different type of practitioner that may be able to address the root cause of the symptoms.
