My first sports massage.

Friday 05/01/07:
First things first...
Out at 6.30am for my run. Another nice day but more cloud and wind about this morning. Did the same out and back route as Wed, mainly in the interest of keeping it fairly flat for now. Its pretty hard to go far round here without bumping into a hill or ten...

Brisk walk warmup: 5mins
Steady paced run: 31mins (6km)
Brisk walk cooldown: 5mins

Saw a couple of other runners out this morning (one particularly good looking one I have to say - had to resist the urge not to turn around and follow him home!) Leg felt pretty good and has remained much the same throughout the day.

Skived off work early so I could get to my appointment at Advanced Massage by 5pm. After spending the first 10mins filling in a very indepth questionaire, I then had a very indepth chat about my injury, followed by a very indepth physical assessment of my flexibility and range of motion from the waist down. So far, so good... There was definately more tightness (and therefore less range) in the injured left leg. She also felt I was rather "tense" body-wise overall - no surprises there - I have been told the same thing numerous times before by my physio, the podiatrist, even my nails lady! Even tho I feel inwardly relaxed and comfortable, it would seem my body is just naturally rather rigid (NOT to be mistaken with frigid!)

She then went into the "massage" session and while some areas were a bit painful, I have felt a hell of a lot worse from the physio in the past. She said it did not need to be excurciating to be effective and that in fact excessive pain can even make you tense up worse and therefore the massage become ineffective... (make of that what you will Ewen...!) She did both legs, but concentrated more on the left one and also alot on the glutes, which she said were very tight (I'll take that in a good way!) She also found lots of tightness in what I've been calling the quad/adductor area, but she said it was actually the band of muscle that runs from the inside leg just above the knee, across the quad area (almost diagonally) and up to the hip. (Perhaps someone can tell me what this is called - she did say it but I didn't have the guts to ask her to write it down!)

At the end of it all, she gave it and my glutes a good stretch and lets just say I was amazed at how flexible you become with warm, massaged muscles! Felt great and she has given me written instuctions on how to do these at home - twice a day - all be it that I won't be as flexible then.

She has advised that a rest day is best for tomorrow (works in with my alternate day running scheduele anyway) and to drink heaps of water. Have to say, right now I feel as if its about to start pouring out my ears and I'm sure my back teeth are floating! (or at least they would be if they were false!!)

Felt great when I walked out of there, my hips in particular seemed to be moving much more freely, even tho I hadn't previously noticed that they weren't. She has warned that there will probably be some muscle soreness tomorrow and that the injury site may even feel a little worse before it starts feeling better. I am going back to her next Friday for another session, before I go away.

So all in all, a good experience, but of course the proof will be in the pudding and it is way too early to tell. Will keep you posted tho (as if there was any doubt!)