Let us help you achieve your health & fitness goals in 2019..
Welcome to 2019!! This is the perfect time of year to kick back, reflect on the year that was, and set some realistic health and fitness goals for the next 12 months and beyond. If you’re reading this blog then I’m assuming that health, fitness, well-being and/or performance (sports or other) are high on your list of priorities.
If you haven’t considered programming a regular maintenance massage into your training routine and lifestyle then it’s worth asking why not?? Trust me .. your body (and brain) will love you for it.
Massage is undoubtedly a fantastic way to chill out and relax, but you may not realise what an enormous difference great quality massage & myotherapy can make to your health, performance and general function. Regular massage could be the difference between keeping you training, loving life and kicking goals, or developing aches, pains, niggles and injuries that limit your exercise & daily living options. This will ultimately prevent you from making the most of this opportunity called living!
Ask yourself ….
• Are you keen to improve your training results?
• Is gaining improved mobility, balance, better sleep, and faster recovery from training on your list?
• Are you interested in accelerating how quickly & efficiently your body detoxifies, and churns through unwanted body fat?
• How about avoiding niggling injuries, aches and pains that frustrate and debilitate you?
If you answered “yes” to any of these then scheduling regular massage, just as you would schedule regular training sessions is key. NB – this is why our successful elite athletes plan and program regular massage into their training routine!!
At the risk of getting a little techy (specifically for the geeks out there!!) some of the ways that remedial massage and myotherapy enhances function include:
– Reduced post exercise muscle soreness (DOMS).
– Reduced muscle and fascial tightness & pain. Painful and restrictive ‘knots’ or trigger points, adhesions and fibrous dehydrated fascial tissues are softened and deactivated.
– Improved joint range of motion and reduced pressure on joints. This results in better movement and less pain, especially if you suffer from joint inflammation or degeneration.
– Accelerated recovery and detoxification by enhancing lymphatic circulation and immune system function. This increases removal of metabolic waste products from our tissues, and boosts detoxification, ultimately accelerating fat and fluid loss.
– Increased ability to switch off and dip into “rest and digest” mode. This promotes better quality sleep and better recovery.
– Improved brain to muscle connection so that your activation of muscles improves. This will help fire-up your metabolism, get you moving with better control and efficiency, and reduce the risk of injury.
– Increased release of happy hormones and endorphins
So essentially by scheduling regular massage into your life, you will be able to sleep better, boost your immunity, get better quality training in, experience less discomfort and pain, burn more bodyfat, back up faster, have loads more energy and be happy!! No-brainer right??
What if you’re already using other services at P3 Sports & Recovery for this, and/or doing self-massage at home. Surely booking in for a dedicated massage consultation won’t make much difference?
Ok, so don’t get me wrong, using the services at P3, and doing self-massage will definitely help your recovery and function. But it doesn’t give you an opportunity for your movement and function to be assessed, to have any little issues picked up and attended to before they become big problems, and to educate you on how to best prevent injury and get on top of niggles with exercises/ stretches and the like.
Seeing a qualified Remedial Massage Therapist or Myotherapist who is experienced in dealing with active population gives you all of this and more!!
Frequency .. how often should you book?? There really is no one-size-fits-all answer to this. We all operate differently, we have different day-to-day stresses, training demands, body shapes and sizes, not to mention that we are striving for different things and also have different priorities and budgets available. The best piece of advice I can give here is to keep an open mind, be prepared for some trial and error, and to simply get started and book a session. Your therapist will guide you from there …