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Showing posts from June, 2014

How Does Sports Massage Improve Your Performance?

It's common knowledge that regularly stretching the muscles helps prevent injuries, but sports massage takes it one step further. Sports massage supports your training and stretching program by building healthier tissues and preventing injuries. Using this type of massage can help you prevent muscle strains and sprains, recover from events and strenuous workouts, and heal from injuries. Before athletic events and workouts, massage prepares you by stretching, loosening, and oxygenating muscles. Between workouts and events, massage can help increase flexibility with assisted stretching and the release of chronically contracted muscles. Massage Increases Circulation After a sports event, massage can hep soothe soft tissues of the body, aid in repairing micro-tears to the muscles, and further help enhance circulation. When tight, bunched muscles relax and lengthen, they aren't apt to press as much on surrounding structures. As a result, when circulation is restored the flow

Massage offers Headache Relief

Research published in the International Journal of Neuroscience, the American Journal of Public Health, and Journal of Child Neurology indicates that massage can reduce the occurrence and frequency of tension and migraine headaches. This supports the experience that many of my massage clients have had in which they tell me they have experienced a decrease in both headaches and neck and shoulder pain. How does massage help? Massage relaxes tense muscles and eases pressure on joints and nerves. When tension held in the muscles of the head, shoulders, and neck eases, there is less agitation to the nerves and blood vessels that supply them. Blood flow is improved and muscle spasms are often relieved. Trigger points in the neck, head and shoulders can be another cause of pain which respond well to specific massage techniques. These factors all add up to the relief of tension or migraine headaches. Massage therapy often reduces the anxiety and worry that can accompany headaches, t