Jenny Kincaid Boone

Jenny Kincaid Boone has been running since she was in eighth grade. She competed in cross country and track at Fort Defiance High School (Fort Defiance, Va.) and at Roanoke College, where she was all-ODAC in cross country for four years. When her knees and legs aren't aching from the wear of years of competition, she hits the 19 to low 20-minute range for a 5K.

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Those massage tables that often are set up after races are good for more than just a 5-minute relaxing session. Massage therapy is a regular part of many runners' routines. And its benefits are broad. It may help runners prepare for a hard workout or a competition or it can help speed recovery after the event. Massage therapy also can be an effective treatment for injuries, such as pulled or strained muscles or achy joints.

Ellen Mahan owns Healing Hands, a massage therapy business in Roanoke. She is a nationally certified massage therapist who treats all kinds of athletes, including runners. Mahan, who's practiced massage therapy for eight years, recently gave some pointers about how massage can work for runners, from regular race competitors to casual joggers.

Q: What kinds athletes come to see you?

A: Probably more casual runners or runners who do run in races. I do work with some professional athletes. I do work with college and high school, football, weightlifters. I work on a lot of golfers. You can take a couple points off their swing. Men in their 50s or 60s, they're losing range of motion. They say, 'I can't reach over, and this is killing my golf game.' So, I work on them and then they have full range of motion, and their golf swing is improved.

Q: What are the kinds of injuries for which runners might need to have therapy and when would they need this kind of therapy?

A: Lots of pulled muscles and strains. Mostly what I do a lot of work with is just preventative or they're a little tight.

There are five types of massage for athletes. There's a general sports massage, and that's used during a time when the athletes are not actively training. You want to decrease recovery time after they've exercised, increase blood flow to the muscles, increase the power of a muscle contraction and decrease the likelihood of damage.

Then, there's training massage, and this is a more energetic type of massage. Five to eight hours before they train is ideal. This is for professional athletes, before training. That could be very difficult to do ideally because if you get up in the morning and run, you're not going to get up and come and see me five hours before you run. But this is done in a very ideal professional setting, where you're working with like an Olympic team. This is all they do& that definitely increases blood flow to muscles.

Then there's pre-event massage. You can start that up two to three days before the competition. Definitely within 24 hours of the event you want to be doing pre-event massage. One of the focuses is you want to increase the performance. This will have a very warming effect to muscles, but absolutely in no way shape or form is this to replace your warm-up and your stretching. I cannot say enough about warming up and stretching, that's going to prevent most injuries right there. The warm-up and stretch is just as important as the workout itself. This type of massage also can give them another workout that it's like your muscles are thinking that they've done the exercise, but the athletes hasn't expended any extra energy. It's physiological.

Then, there's post event massage, which is just after competition. They have to be cooled down. If they come to me panting, sweaty, they have to go cool down. This is the focus of this massage is to restore the athletes' working ability, restore strength and energy and help reduce the stress from the whole event.

The fifth is for injury and trauma. It is treatment of injury, in case they over do it.

Q: What is the main benefit of using massage therapy to treat an injury?

A: It helps them heal faster with greater results, and recovery of that area. It increases the flow of blood& to the area. When you're working, it's called frictioning, and you don't actually move on the surface of the skin. You're sticking to the surface of the skin, but you're moving the tissue below. You can work with the fiber of the muscle or across the fiber of the muscle, depending on what you want to do. That helps the healing of scars and increases the mobility of joints, and it's actually the main medical stroke for the treatment of joints.

Q: You specialize in Russian sports massage. What is this kind of massage?

A: It's a series of specialized techniques used to get physiological results from the body. Regular massages or if you go in for a general massage, the strokes are based on the anatomy of it. We're going to work from one end of the muscle to the other end of the muscle. We're going to work on this tendon and without really the focus being how it affects the body. When you're doing [Russian] sports massage, yes, you know your anatomy. You're going to be working on this muscle and this tendon. But the strokes you're using are specifically designed to get a physiological effect. We need to increase blood flow to this area. We need to stimulate this muscle. We need to calm this muscle down. We need to cease cramping in this muscle.

Q: How many times per week or month do athletes come to you for treatment of an injury or for regular maintenance?

A: It's going to vary. Most folks come about once a month for maintenance, my average people. And then I do have some athletes who will come every week or every two weeks. I've had some people who've had to come a couple times during the week or three times during the week, working through something very specific. When you're working in a professional sports setting, you are working with those athletes daily. It's part of their workout.

Ellen Mahan, owner of the Healing Hands massage therapy business in Roanoke, demonstrates a massage technique that she uses on some runners.

Upcoming local races:

June 4: AEP Festival Run, 5K and 10K, Roanoke, http://commonwealthgames.org/aepfestivalrun.html

June 4: Chuck Shelton 5K run/walk, Radford's Bisset Park, 250-5453

June 11: Varmint Half Marathon and 5K, Burkes Garden, email: cmcdaniel@tazewell.k12.va.us

June 11: Rudy Martin Memorial 5K-trail run, Hungry Mother State Park, Marion, 800-625-6178