What is the best way to massage? 1. To massage and hurt the person?
2. To massage and not hurt the person? 3. To massage and there to be pain the next day but better the next? 4. To massage and there to be no pain during or the next day and for the massage to have fixed the problem?
If point “4” what or how is the best way to arrive at this point?
One way i know of is to push directly onto the sore part after a warm up rub, start very slowly and only just touching, and eventually be pushing that hard that the sore muscle in question is squashed in completly without there being any pain, if pain arrives, back of and start again. work around the sore part of the muscle till all done and squashed, then after leaving for a couple of minutes, give like a warm down rub. Seems to work allright. Any other ideas???
treat the person and release tightness with as little pain/discomfort as possible
when i had muscles spasms and tightness in my quads i got a massage that was VERY painful, even though the muscles did not feel too sore to begin with. it was very deep and the person treating me knew that it hurt, and it was sore for 5 days… but this was not close to any major competition, and i did not have any more quad problems that season.
so maybe in some cases pain is gain.
You’ll often note that the initial work on the quads is very painful, but a slightly easier lead-in will allow for more tolerable deep work a few minutes later.