Sports massage is primarily concerned with injury prevention. However, most of the time we are using it in the treatment of chronic injuries, pain, overuse syndrom and acute injuries in rehabilitation or ongoing treatment of aches and pains. Just because it's called sports massage many people think it's just for athletes. This is just not true, it's especially good for athletes, but everybody can benefit from it. How it differs from other massage forms is in it's slightly different techniques. They are specifically, compression massage, used with the palms of the hand and a rythmic movement pressing on the muscle. The other technique is cross fiber massage, which can be applyed with oil. Strokes are done at 90 degrees across the muscle and tendon. It is more commonly done without oil, used on the belly or tendons by moving the skin over the muscle, not rubbing the skin. This creates many beneficial effects on the tissue systems, starting with reducing swelling, adheasions, micro-traumas, lubrication, increased blood flow on and on. Then there is the most powerful technique in all massage; Deep Transverse Friction (DTF):started by Dr. James Cyriax, MD, an English Orthopedic Surgeon. He was the bigest proponent of this method, using it for the majority of his patients' minor injuries. It has to be very specifically applied for it to work and not create more irritation of the actual movement of the body. DTF is a great techinque for tendons, adhesions, mircro-tears and musculotendenous joints and connections. Even trigger points and swidish in the right areas is going to aid the body in accelerating the healilng.

Of course before the rehabilitative stage, rest, ice, compression and elevation (RICE) is the preferred treatment plan for most athletic injuries. (see injuries)

The usual athletic injury, whether due to a direct blow, tear , or overstretch, results in same pathological tissue damage. Tissue death, blood seepage out of the vessels and capillaries that create a hematoma. This is a mass of tissue debris and blood with extra calcium and othe chemicals the body dumps in the system . It's shocked, and everything binds up, to protect itself. A muscle spasm is the first sign of injury, if you push it further the signs intensify.

The following part to the injury and shock is the inflammatory response creates an enlargement of the original hematoma. It's the bodys cast, it sends all the white blood cells and nutrients in there. Extra calcium, for repair. The problem is that it back fires on itself by causing tissue death due to slowed blood flow and oxygen starvation. All this time the initial tissue damage will occur as soon as the trauma has occurred and the cycle can be broken immediatly with the application of RICE will keep the damage from secondary effects down and accelarate the healing.

The pre-event massage is usually not done very deep, unless they are really used to it even then, we don't deep work other than a technique that consists of some Deep Compressions . We use some times use massage comprised of effleurage, petrissage and direct pressure , on tight areas mostly tendons. We may even use a little Deep Transverse Friction (DTF), Circular Friction, as a Post-event treatment . You need to take care and take the amount of therapy the athlete has had as well as his possible conditions. I have seen athletes that got some very good deep massage and they ran badly. They where not use to it.

Mainly a pre-event massage is used to improve the speed, power, endurance of the athelte. it can get him to perform at the top of his ability. We saw it over and over an athlete that is balanced sturcturally one that has learned to strength and stretch the right places. Obviously a well balanced timed and properly build machine (which is the human body) runs better. Sports massage is used in injury prevention in the athlete more than any other type of massage. This is because of the way it's designed and the ultimate results you are seeking. Structural balance. This is the Key...................

The usual effects of the pre-event massage are: Improved Circulation, loosen the muscles up too, cellular nutrition through the dilation of the capillaries with deep compression, or to the heart strokes. Transverse friction (DTF) is some of the best of the techniques for tight, cronic or sorte spots. (Read Cyriax ). Also the break up of adhesions with deep transverse friction helps in increased motion. It also improves the circulation to tendons and ligaments as well.

You need to be carful to use this technique, you can make an injury worse, with too much DTF. Used properly it can get rid of a knot in a muscle, a sore tendon, or even a hot trigger point, that could allow the athelte to go beyond what may hurt or limit him down the road. DTF promotes a well functioning body, it's a valuable tool. Like all therapy, when properly given to atheletes on a regular basis, the pre-event massage improves the peak performance with less injury and better recooperation time.

Sports Massage is also valuable in rehabilitation work, and unfortunatly the problems we see more of in the clinic are due to some type of injury. Either tramatic, as in contact sports, pushing the envelop in competition or overtraining. Pushing the body beyond the foundation that was laid (reffer to laws of training, building a base) will cause many problems with runners or any intense type of athlete.

Post-event sports massage is used primarily for recuperation from the event, race or after an intense training session. I recomend any athlete that is serious about training to get a massage (sports massege from knowledgable therapist) once a week, you're investing a lot in your body, just like a car it needs regular tune-ups. At the very least twice a month. You still better be doing yoga or a whole lot of stretching. The runners I use to see did between 90 miles to 100 a week..............yes a week. I use to say just let me hit your legs with a 2 by 4 and run fifty less, you'll get the same benefit.

The post-event massage will speed up the recovery after all out effort in training or a race and aid in taking out the lactic acid, hystamines and other toxins it promotes great relaxation as well. Most atheltes are so charged up you got to get them to come down off that race. Trigger points release tension and you can remove spasms with compressions as well as with circular friction, another form of DTF. It also takes a lot of stress out of the nervous system. Acupuncture, acupressure and trigger points all work on the electrical part of the body. Some other forms of massage like Tragger, Feldenkris, and polarity all work on the electrical system as well.

Sports massage is primarily concerned with structure and chemistry. Think of the body like a car, just for a minute, it's a great miracle this body. But to simplify a point. Tuning up the car makes it run better, but if the wheel (structure) is out of alignment it will drive terrible. The other part chemistry, if you put the wrong gas in the car it may not run at all! So work on the problems with the right tools and you get better results. You could get any massage and it will feel good, the results that you get are dependent on they type and the desired results.

TECHNIQUES FOR COMPRESSION

The essence compression work is deep repetitive pressure to the belly of the muscle. Usually you find a knot, and apply the techinque to it for a few minutes. The compressions should be administered in a nice rythem, always breathing with the patient and exhaling as you apply the pressure. Stay within tollerance never go into pain. You can't fight pain with more pain, remember that. This promotes circulation to the deep tissue and is more tollerable than the fingers or DTF.

WIDE DEEP STOKES

Wit wide deep stokes(swedish, lymphatic) we are cleansing the body. We are aiding in it's elimination, as well as lymph and blood movement. This is the chemical level. A full body massage can take approximately one hour to one and one-half hours to complete. This is tough to do these days. I use to do full hour and some times hour and a half. But it gets very difficult to put that much time in. I go more for frequencesy rather than intensity. While some of this massage work must be deep to be effective. You still have to stay withing the athletes pain tolerance. You can do deep tissue work without pain by slowly building up. I don't try to do the deep tissue work in the first session. You can go deep by slowling increasing the pressure as you work with someone. They didn't build that body in a day and you can't help them in one session to change it. It takes time, knowledge and care to build a body. Massage can help,but the key is proper training and the right exercise program. To structurally correct muscle imbalance.

DTF(deep transverse friction)

We could write a whole book on DTF and some doctors have. With transverse friction to the tendons (origin and insertion) and progressively going deeper with each set. You can take away so much stress of a joint that it makes a huge difference in competition as well as every day life. I just don't do DTF on atletes, heck everybody needs it.

In general, we do most sports massage or cprrective body work sessions with three (3) sets of compressions alternated with three (3) sets of deep transverse friction (DTF). We usually will take one muscle group at a time. I usually work on the biggest muscles first and work my way to the smallest. From the belly to the tendons, and from the tendons to the ligaments. (See Spirit massage for my work on ligaments).

Muscle spasms or cramps are acute conditions the can be stopped with deep compression (Just grab hold of the cramp), or origin and insertion techniques(push muscle together from the origin and insertion) from Kinesiology. They have way too many causes to go into here look at chapter on muscles. Adhesions, and other abnomalities in the belly or other soft tissue of the muscle will be addressed through friction (DTF) and direct pressure (Trigger Points, shiatsu or accupressure). For more detail on specific treatment see sports injuries treatment in Sports Massage II.