Massage Sessions
Simple Bookings, Tailored Treatments.
We keep booking a massage as straightforward as possible. You simply need to book yourself in for a 30, 60, or 90 minute session for a date and time that fits your schedule, and that's it!
When you arrive at our Salford clinic, you advise your therapist what style of treatment you prefer, or highlight the specific areas of the body that feel tight, restricted, or sore for training and daily life. From there, we build a custom treatment on the spot. There's no rigid, robotic routine here - every session is uniquely tailored to what your body needs on the day.
What our massage clients say...
What is massage good for?
From a clinical and physiological perspective, massage therapy does far more than just feel good. Evidence-based sports medicine shows that targeted soft tissue manipulation acts as a biological catalyst for recovery and performance.
Regular massage therapy is highly effective for:
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Accelerating Neuromuscular Recovery: Studies show that deep tissue manipulation significantly down-regulates inflammatory proteins (cytokines) that cause pain after hard training. Simultaneously, it stimulates mitochondrial biogenesis (the creation of new energy producers inside your muscle cells) speeding up overall muscle tissue repair.
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Reducing Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness (DOMS): By mechanically boosting localised micro-circulation, massage increases the delivery of oxygen, essential nutrients and repair cells to microscopic muscle tears while assisting the lymphatic system to flush out cellular waste products. This can reduce the severity of post-workout muscle soreness so you can keep training hard and performing well.
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Restoring Joint Range of Motion (ROM): Repetitive athletic movements and long hours sitting still at a desk cause muscle fibres to shorten and fascial layers to bind together. Massage breaks down these microscopic tissue adhesions, instantly increasing tissue extensibility and restoring movement capacity to your joints.
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Down-Regulating Nervous System Stress: Intense physical training and daily work stress keep your nervous system locked in a sympathetic "fight-or-flight" state, which increases muscle tension and halts recovery. Massage stimulates the vagus nerve, shifting your body into a parasympathetic "rest-and-digest" state. This lowers systemic cortisol (stress hormone) levels and triggers immediate muscular relaxation.
What techniques do we use? The science of tissue repair
Depending on the style you choose, your therapist will strategically blend evidence-based clinical techniques to maximize your results. Your session could include:
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Myofascial Release (MFR) - We may use this at the beginning of a deep tissue session, before applying any oil to your skin. This technique utilises traction on the skin to stretch the fascia, the connective tissue wrapping your muscles to help them work collectively. Releasing the fascial tension first makes the subsequent deep muscle work significantly more effective.
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Effleurage & Petrissage (Warm-Up) - Once the fascia is addressed, we apply a natural grapeseed massage oil to your skin and begin to use long, sweeping strokes (effleurage) and kneading techniques (petrissage). This mechanically warms up the tissue layers, stimulates fresh blood flow and prepares the muscle fibres for firmer pressure.
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Deep Structural Compression - For deep tissue work, we utilise our knuckles, forearms, and elbows to apply targeted, deep pressure to tight muscle groups. This deep compression is completely guided by your feedback. Everyone has a different threshold for pressure, and we work closely with you to ensure the pressure produces the results we are seeking but remains comfortable.
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Trigger Point Therapy & Cross-Frictions - If we locate a hyper-irritable muscle knot (what we refer to as a trigger point) or an area of dysfunctional tissue during your session, we switch to localised techniques. Direct ischemic pressure (Trigger Point Therapy) or deep back-and-forth manipulation across the muscle fibres (Deep Transverse Frictions) are used to force the locked fibres to reset and kickstart the cellular repair process.
What is the difference between Sports Massage & Deep Tissue?
While these terms are often interchanged because they share overlapping techniques, the main difference comes down to timing and intent:
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Sports Massage is tied to an event: It is strategically timed around your physical activity. A pre-event sports massage uses rapid, lighter techniques to stimulate blood flow and prepares muscles and fascia for exercise and activity. A post-event recovery massage uses gentle, flushing strokes to clear metabolic waste without further tearing already damaged muscle fibres, initiating recovery so you don't feel broken the next day.
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Deep Tissue Massage is tied to your routine: If you are fitting a massage session into your normal work week or standard training block, Deep Tissue is what you need. It uses deliberate, firmer pressure to structurally alter tight tissues, stimulate cellular remodelling, release fascial adhesions and relax overactive muscles. We recommend timing this so you can refrain from intense activity for at least 24 hours after your massage, to get the best results from your session.
Getting the best results: Aftercare
Because a thorough deep tissue massage stimulates your muscles to relax, repair and recover - your body needs time to process the treatment and regenerate to an improved state - much like after a workout.
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Expect mild soreness: It is entirely normal to feel a workout-like muscle soreness for 24 to 48 hours after a deep tissue session. Areas that have received extra targeted work like Trigger Point Therapy may be more tender than other areas too.
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Plan a rest day: We highly recommend avoiding high-intensity training or heavy lifting for at least 24 hours after your session. Try scheduling your appointment the day before your scheduled rest day so your body can dedicate its full energy to repairing the tissues.
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Avoid overeating that day: if you over-indulge after a massage session you may not get the best outcome. Your body only has so much energy to dedicate to jobs it needs to do. If you eat a big meal after your massage session, your body will likely dedicate most of it's resources to digesting that meal and therefore won't do it's best work to repair and regenerate all of your muscle and soft tissue cells that we just asked it to assess and improve.
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Keep hydrated: All of that cell metabolic waste we just circulated from your muscles needs to be flushed out of your body. If you drink extra water and go to the bathroom a couple more times over the next 24 hours, you'll be doing a great job of detoxifying your system. Keeping alcohol and caffeine consumption low during that period will help too, as those are known to dehydrate us.
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Utilise movement to help you recover: Low-intensity activity like walking, yoga or stretching can aid your recovery from a deep tissue massage because it further stimulates blood flow in the muscles and fascia which will deliver more oxygen, nutrients and repair cells to those tissues. This will all help you feel better for longer.
Do we offer massage package deals?
We don't currently offer package deals for any of our treatments or services, because we don't believe in telling our clients that they need a certain amount of sessions in order to feel better or overcome something that is bothering them.
We do however, offer a Monthly Massage Membership Plan which supports you in committing to your own personal wellbeing and makes it easy to deal with the logistics of planning your sessions.
We know how quickly time flies, and how easy it is to let three months pass you by before you know it. Then you notice how sore your neck and shoulders are from your long days sat working at your desk, or how sore your legs are from all of your running or training. You think back and can't even remember how long it's been since you went for a massage!
The Monthly Massage Membership Plan here at Mountain Sports Therapy is our way to ensure that you never let yourself get to that stage again, where you so desperately NEED a massage. We stay on top of things together with your regular monthly visits and you get all of the expert support and guidance you want, which can help steer your training or daily habits along the way.
How it works:
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Once you realise how amazing your massage sessions are with your favourite MST therapist, you can ask to sign up for the Monthly Massage Membership Plan, and that session will be counted as your first month of a one year Membership plan (you can start at any time of year).
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You set up a Standing Order bank transfer for your monthly payment to be made at the beginning of every month so the payment is taken care of without any extra work for each visit.
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You book your session for next month at the end of every massage session, based on your availability and ours.
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You get your 12th massage session of the year completely FREE. It's as simple as that!
There's no big contract to sign or legal commitment to the Membership Plan, it's just our way of helping you commit to taking care of yourself with regular recovery treatments. And because we want to reward you for letting us help you look after yourself, we'll give you a that FREE session which makes it an even sweeter deal!
As an extra bonus, we also then offer you a 10% discount for all other treatments and services that you visit the clinic for. So if you randomly pick up an injury playing sports or want to learn more about how to optimise your training routine, we are here to help with that too.
*Full Terms and Conditions apply and can be found here in the Agreement Document.
How often should you get a massage?
There is no "one-size-fits-all" frequency for massage therapy. From a sports science perspective, how often you should book a session depends entirely on your training volume, your lifestyle, and what your body is currently trying to recover from.
To help you get the best out of your body, we recommend matching your schedule to one of the following evidence-based categories:
1. The Chronic Injury or Pain Stage (Every 1–2 Weeks)
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Who it’s for: Anyone who is currently dealing with a specific, nagging injury, constant muscle spasms, severe postural imbalances, or pain that interferes with daily wellbeing, training or sleep.
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The Logic: When a muscle is deeply dysfunctional, it takes repetitive, regular interventions to break the nervous system's "pain-spasm cycle". Frequent sessions over a short, 3-4 week block can allow us to structurally remodel the tight tissue and establish a new baseline of movement before your body can snap back into its old, painful habits. We guide you on adapting daily habits or routines to compliment this work, to help you get the best results.
2. The High-Volume Training Stage (Every 2–3 Weeks)
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Who it’s for: Anyone who is actively training for a big event (like a Marathon, triathlon or Hyrox race), stepping up your riding or skating frequency, lifting heavy multiple times a week, or averaging more than 5 hours of intense physical activity a week.
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The Logic: High-volume training means your muscles are constantly enduring microscopic tearing and accumulating metabolic fatigue. A regular deep tissue every 2-3 weeks keeps localised inflammation in check, continuously clears fascial restrictions, and prevents minor tightness from snowballing into an overuse injury that could affect your training, or worse, makes you miss your event.
3. The Maintenance & Prevention Stage (Every 4–6 Weeks)
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Who it’s for: Anyone generally feels good but wants to keep their body moving well, prevent any old injuries from flaring up, and counteract the physical strain of sitting at a desk for 40 hours a week or leading an active, family lifestyle.
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The Logic: A monthly "tune-up" is the gold standard for preventative care. It's a good starting point if you're ready to commit to keeping on top of things and allows your therapist to assess your body regularly, locate subtle, developing muscle knots before you even feel them causing pain, and address any tissue restrictions to ensure you maintain your full joint mobility and muscular health for the long-term. Ask us about taking advantage of our Monthly Massage Membership Plan if this is the stage you're at.
The Takeaway: Think of massage therapy like servicing your car. You know you shouldn't wait for the engine to completely seize before getting the oil changed or for the rubber to wear down to the rims before replacing the tyres. Regular maintenance keeps your body feeling good and moving optimally, meaning you spend less time in pain or out injured and more time doing what you love.
Regular massage isn't a luxury treatment like perhaps it once was. It's now a valuable tool in helping us take care of ourselves in the demanding and stressful environment of the modern world we live in.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: How long should I book for?
A: For your first visit, we recommend at least a 60 minute session so we can spend 5 minutes discussing your circumstances and ensure we provide the best possible experience.
Otherwise, this is a good guide:
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30 minutes - good for targeting a particular problem area to provide some relief
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60 minutes - good for a thorough upper/lower body massage treatment, or a full body massage with a little less time spent on each part of the body
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90 minutes - good for a thorough full body massage, still with time to focus on a couple of problem areas. It's the ultimate indulgent treatment to switch off and escape reality for a while.
Q: Does a deep tissue massage have to hurt to be effective?
A: Absolutely not. While deep tissue work can feel intense or "comfortably tender" when we work on a stubborn trigger point, it should never cause you to hold your breath or tense up. Defensive bracing actually stops the muscles from relaxing. We constantly communicate with you to find the right balance, ensure the pressure is productive and entirely within your comfort zone. More pain does not equal more gain.
Q: What should I wear to my session?
A: For a back, neck, and shoulder massage, you will need to remove all of your upper body clothing and you will be securely and professionally covered with towels (draped) throughout the session, exposing only the area being worked on. Ladies can remove or unclasp their bra to allow access to the muscles on their back. Sports bras don't give your therapist the access they need to provide the best treatment.
If we are working on your legs (e.g. runners or cyclists), then wearing a pair of loose, sports shorts that aren't too tight around your thighs is ideal. Again you will be draped and covered appropriately, so if your are comfortable in just your underwear, that is fine too.
Your comfort in our environment is our priority and we will respectfully work with you to ensure you get the treatment experience you are seeking.
