Sports Massage Benefits For Professional Athletes

It’s no secret that sports massage provides a number of benefits to professional athletes and sports teams around the world, but what about the average gym member or your personal training clients who train by choice, rather than for a career? Is sports massage important for them? Of course it is!“Anyone who exercises on a regular basis should be receiving massages weekly or fortnightly”, says David Ward, Massage Coach for AIF in NSW, and here is why.

DOMS aka delayed onset muscle soreness

If you have pushed yourself through a hard session in the past you may have felt a little worse for wear the next day. Well don’t panic, you aren’t injured; consider this the by product of your hard work. The discomfort you felt is from our trusty friend ‘DOMS’, aka delayed onset muscle soreness is best treated with a good old sports massage! By scheduling in regular massages, the benefits extend further than relieving a bit of muscle tension, you will also experience a decrease in the amount of time you spend in recovery mode and decrease the amount of tension you hold in your muscles. This is achieved by helping flush your tissues with fresh, nutrient rich blood, helping your tissues heal quicker.

Help your personal training clients reach their goals sooner

If you’re a Personal Trainer, then consider your client’s performance in your sessions. Are their squats deep? Do their hips cramp at the bottom of the movement? Is the movement fluid or does it look uncontrolled? If you find yourself constantly modifying your clients’ exercises to accommodate injuries that may have been prevented with massage, help them reach their goals sooner by referring them to a therapist.

If you are a therapist, I don’t need to preach the benefits of massage, however, it is a great idea to partner with a Personal Trainer. Not only will you help these clients reach their fitness goals faster and help prevent injury, you also open your business up to future referral work, win-win!

Enhance your training performance

If you constantly exercise without resting, stretching or having massages, then you will predispose your musculoskeletal system for injury and dysfunction, which may lead you to burning out in the long run. Therefore, if your muscles are healthy and relaxed, you will have more fluid, pain free movement, and in conjunction with proper training, you will see ENHANCED PERFORMANCE!

Regardless of your, or your clients’ goals, sports massage has benefits for all. Research shows that if you participate in a high intensity workout (to failure) deep tissue massage can give you a slight increase in muscle size and can increase production of mitochondria (cells that convert nutrients to energy). Furthermore, massage is known to relieve stress, boost immunity and enhance exercise performance. The list goes on!

So, If you want to be at the top of your game, reach your goals and have mental clarity, you need regular sports massages. We could talk for hours about the physical and psychological benefits of massage but you are best to try it and see the benefits first hand, so why not book yourself in for one and see the benefits yourself?!

• Bio

AIF

The Australian Institute of Fitness

The Australian Institute of Fitness (AIF) is the largest and longest established fitness training organisation in Australia, with dynamic training methods and expert course coaches nationwide - spanning fitness, massage and nutrition. The AIF qualifies more fitness professionals than any other provider in Australia, as well as offering a broad range of continuing education courses (CEC), upskilling resources and partnership programs for existing industry.