Sports Massage Therapy

Massage stretches and lengthens shortened muscles and reduces spasm.

Massage improves circulation, which speeds up removal of waste products that can make you sore and brings in oxygen and nutrients your muscles need to rejuvenate.

By helping your muscles return to normal function, massage can help you resume activity sooner, enhance your performance, and help your muscles work efficiently.

Regular sports massage is an important part of a training routine because chronic tension can impair performance and lead to injury.

Photos by Robert Whitehead.

The following is adapted from The Healing Art of Sports Massage by Joan Johnson.

Any athlete who cross-trains knows that increased workouts lead to improved performance. But some neglect the equally important area of recovery. With a full recovery, you will be able to push previous boundaries and adapt to a new level of stress.

Why carry your soreness and stiffness from your last workout with you? Why not take measures now to speed your recovery from your effort so you can reach a higher level in your next workout? Sports massage provides the secret weapon for complete recovery by targeting specific muscle groups used in sports activity. Regular massage has the following benefits:

• Help identify tender areas before they develop into injuries.
• Enhance overall body awareness.
• Stretch and relax muscles.
• Relieve muscle pain and spasms.
• Free muscle adhesions and soften scar tissue caused by injury.
• Improve range of motion.
• Restore suppleness and elasticity
• Improve blood and lymph circulation.
• Flush out toxins that cause muscle stiffness and soreness.
• Speed recovery from muscular exertion.
• Relax mind and body.

Well-trained athletes are complete: eating properly, training efficiently, relaxing, getting massages, and pursuing other interests besides sports. They are able to balance physical training, mental training, massage, relaxation, and rest.

"Fitness has to be fun. If it is not play, there will be no fitness. Play, you see, is the process. Fitness is merely the product."
   - George Sheehan, M.D., Runner’s World

"Physical exercise is not merely necessary to the health and development of the body, but to balance and correct intellectual pursuits as well. The mere athlete is brutal and Philistine, the mere intellectual unstable and spiritless. The right education must tune the strings of the body and mind to perfect spiritual harmony."   - Plato

Also on this site:

What are the best abdominal exercises?

Stretching Information and Exercises

Yoga Introduction

Pilates Introduction



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