Sports Massage is for Everyone

We get a lot of questions regarding sports massage and if it’s just for sports people or athletes, so, I thought it would be a good idea to write a blog on just some of the benefits that the everyday person could see from receiving sports massage.

People tend to see the words ‘Sports Massage’ and presume that this type of massage is solely for sports people and athletes. The truth, however, is that while sports massage is used on athletes and highly benefits athletes all over the world, it is also highly beneficial to the average person whether you exercise regularly or don’t exercise at all. There are lots and lots of different benefits to sports massage, too many to write about in one go, so I’ll just bring your attention to a few key ways that sports massage could help you in everyday life.

Sports massage can have physiological and psychological benefits, but one of the main aims of sports massage is to induce a sense of relaxation and calmness.

Sports massage causes a release of endorphins (mood lifting hormones) into the blood stream, these help to decrease anxiety levels and any feelings of irritability, but are also natural pain killers, so they will help fight any muscular pain and even help decrease or eliminate headaches. The release of endorphins results in an uplift in mood and leaves you feeling more positive and energetic. This uplift in mood then has a direct impact on a person’s stress levels by reducing stress. So if you’re feeling stressed in any way, whether it be just through general life or your job then sports massage could be a massive help to you and impact your everyday life in a hugely positive way.

Sometimes jobs can cause problems within our bodies, but because it happens gradually we don’t realise it’s actually happening and these problems go unnoticed, we then begin to just accept this as part of everyday life. One easy example would be an office job resulting in bad posture, but that bad posture didn’t happen overnight, it happened gradually by the person being sat in an unnatural position for large periods of time (e.g. hunched over typing on a keyboard). Bad posture is just one example, our jobs can also lead to tightness in our muscles and a decrease in our range of motion (R.O.M). Another thing that could lead to tightness in the muscles and a decreased R.O.M is an injury or as a result of surgery that maybe hasn’t been rehabilitated correctly. Sports massage in these instances could help you by decreasing muscle tightness and increasing your R.O.M in the joints.

While on the subject of injuries and surgeries, the recovery process after an injury or a surgery is a very important aspect. Sports massage supports this recovery process by speeding the healing process through its various techniques depending on the nature of the injury.

A final point, and one that I have left until last because I may write the next blog on this benefit, is the fact that sports massage can help decrease chronic pain. Some people live with chronic pain for huge lengths of time and may even end up having to be prescribed medication to help fight the pain. Sports massage can help in this situation by decreasing this pain. Although we’ve briefly covered above that massage can decrease and eliminate pain (acute pain), we didn’t cover chronic pain which is usually defined as a pain that’s lasted for more than 12 weeks. We’ve already had a few clients who have come to us with chronic pain in different parts of the body and each one has noted a decrease in the pain after just one session. So if you are suffering with chronic pain or any pain in general, it may be worth booking in for a sports massage to see if it can also benefit yourself.

So in a nutshell, sports massage can help you positively in your everyday life in many different ways. Imagine, moving easier/more freely, moving pain free, feeling less stressed, more energised, more positive in your mindset and much more calm and relaxed. All these relate to everyday life and your ‘average person’ so don’t be put off by the title “Sports Massage” and remember that Sports Massage is for everyone!