Athletes and non-athletes alike seek out the services of massage therapists as a means of loosening tight muscles and achieving a sense of relaxation. Deep tissue massage is a particular type of massage that is used primarily by athletes, most likely because it is not a relaxing experience, and in particular it is frequently sought out by athletes with muscle and connective-tissue injuries.
Significance
According to Greg Smith of the Colorado Institute of Massage Therapy in an interview with eSSORTMENT, deep tissue massage--unlike conventional massage--stretches and elongates muscles because the therapist runs his or her hands along the muscles' entire length. While there is some relaxing effect, the primary aim is to reduce muscle tension and, where applicable, muscle inflammation.
Misconceptions
Many people, among them massage therapists, believe that massage helps clear lactic acid build-up from muscles and hence promotes recovery and reduces soreness by ridding the body of a toxic by-product. This is not true, according to massagetherapy.com. Lactic acid is passively cleared from muscles without help. In addition, some fear that deep tissue massage can itself cause injury. Greg Smith, however, notes that in 2004, there were only two reported injuries out of millions of deep tissue massages.
Features
As noted on Squidoo, deep tissue massage can be uncomfortable or even painful, even in the hands of a skilled and experienced practitioner. Since the rationale behind this type of massage is reducing tension, muscle injuries in which tightness is a factor are those most likely to improve after deep tissue massage. Post-massage soreness is common, and drinking plenty of water and taking anti-inflammatories are typical recommendations.
Effects
As noted on massagetherapy.com, the effects of massage are not purely physical, but also emotional and neurological. The former feeds into the immune system, while the latter helps relax muscles directly through various muscle-cell receptors. Both factors serve to lower muscular metabolic activity, which in turn leads to a slower accumulation of unwanted by-products and indirectly promotes increased blood flow.
Benefits
The benefits of deep-tissue massage may often be as much psychological as physical. Athletes commonly report a greater sense of recovery following a massage, even when there is no corroborating physical evidence, since the latter is hard to verify.
The sense of being nurtured helps counteract the immune suppression that heavy exercise can produce, and decreased recovery time from both injuries as well as typical training stresses allow athletes to train harder and more often, leading to enhanced competitive performance.
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