Author: blogger

If you are a serious athlete or even a recreational athlete then you already know that your daily regiment prepares you for optimal use of your skills and energies for your favored sporting event. However, continuous exercise and fitness regimen also causes extreme soreness and muscle tension that gets increasingly worse if you do not take good care of the sore muscles and tensions that your body experiences.

Moreover, because you workout almost every day, the day-to-day soreness is inevitable and trying to relax by cooling off with stretches, steam and watching some television to zone off does not do enough for your body. You need to be completely rejuvenated from your every day workout to excel and stretch your boundaries the next day that is why you need a rejuvenating and relaxing sports massage.

If you are a serious athlete then you are probably already recommend a regular sports massage regimen that is built-in to your fitness regimen. If it is not, then it is time to seriously consider including it into your fitness schedule. Sports massage ensures that the soft tissues that you regularly work with are systematically manipulated. A variety of techniques and stokes are used. A sports therapist will recommend anything from effleurage, petrissage, friction, compression, gliding, percussion or trigger point focused massage. You may also be offered a mixture of these massage techniques to achieve maximum rejuvenation of your tissues.

The effleurage and petrissage movement in sports massage is said to increase blood flow through the vessels relieving your from tight muscles, deep massage enhances the supply of oxygen and other nutrients by opening pores, encouraging blood flow and excretion so that waste products like lactic acid can be removed quickly. Gliding and stretching movements that are a part of sports massage allows for complete relaxation by releasing tension that is naturally accumulated in the muscles because of an athlete’s regimen.

Sports massage is known to increase a sport persons sporting tenure by ensuring psychological and physiological relaxation and rejuvenation. The psychological benefits achieved from a well done sports massage include relief from anxiety, stress and improvement in mood. Most athletes that use sports massage report a sense of deep relaxation and well-being after their sports massage sessions. Massage is known to activate the parasympathetic nervous system that in turn reduces heart rate, blood pressure and cortisol levels causes this feeling of deep relaxation and well-being.

Scientific evidence indicates that sports massage decreases muscle soreness and enhances relaxation, two important ingredients that make a strong athlete. Overall, sports massage is known to maintain the body in a good condition by reducing or preventing injuries that are caused due to stiff muscles. They restore and rejuvenate the deep tissues and restore mobility to injured muscle tissue. They boost performance by targeting the psychology and physiological aspects of an individual and they are also known to extend the overall life of an athlete’s career.

Pre-teen sports teams give young people a great opportunity to participate in a team sport, make new friends, and learn about teamwork. Besides being great fun and keeping them out of trouble, participation in pre-teen sports also gives young people a solid foundation for the future.

While fundraising on the part of parents, coaches and teachers is good and effective, the young people enjoying team sports can also enjoy participating in the fundraising themselves.

Encouraging participation

Everybody loves pre-teen sports, and sometimes the parents get even more excited about it than the kids. At the very beginning of the season, send out a fundraising letter or hold a meeting with all the parents to discuss fundraising, if for no other reason, to get them prepared to spend some time and get into a fundraising mode. Leverage the parents that were involved the year before. Encourage them to help out again in sharing their ideas and wisdom with the rest of the group. Get the kids interested too. Discuss the need for fundraising with them, and tell them about a few fundraising ideas. Kids are natural salespeople, and will be able to help out a lot towards their own cause–don’t make the mistake of just leaving all the fundraising to the parents.

Set the stage for participation in the next fundraiser too, by making sure to recognize the hard work done by all the volunteers, including both students and parents, making sure everyone knows the results of the fundraising, and sending a “thank you” to donors.

Have specific goals

Pre-teen sports teams can always use money for something, whether it’s new uniforms, awards, field trips, or equipment. But each fundraising initiative should have a specific and realistic goal that everybody is working for. When a child says “will you buy a box of candy to help us buy uniforms,” they’re a lot more likely to get a positive response than if they simply say, “will you buy a box of candy.” Also, you’ll get your parent and student volunteers more excited about fundraising if they know what they are working towards. Raising money for the “general fund” isn’t nearly as glamorous as raising money for something tangible that everybody can see and is within reach.

Specific goals are easy to come by. Pre-teen sports teams aren’t known for having large amounts of wealth, and there’s almost always something they need. Even if the team is school-sponsored, schools all over the country are suffering from cutbacks and often don’t have the funds to support the teams like they should. Keep in mind too, there are a lot of corporate sponsors and local businesses that would love to help, and would love to have some positive publicity. If they know exactly what is needed, you may have a chance of getting just a handful of companies together to foot the bill for the equipment, trips, or uniforms you need.

Getting support from community businesses

A common method of getting support from local businesses is to publish a yearbook, or sell ads on your team sports programs. It’s not hard to get the support of local merchants, but you do need to follow a few simple guidelines:

In addition to describing the benefit a donation will give to the team, describe the benefit to the individual merchant. You will be much more likely to get a donation if you are offering something to the merchant of value. This may come in the form of ad space in a program, having their company name displayed in the clubhouse, or a mention over the loudspeaker at halftime.

Follow up after the fundraiser is over. Send a “thank you” letter or a small token of appreciation to every donor. This shows them that you appreciate their support–and it also sets the stage for their participation in future events.

Give them a range of options. Don’t ask for the same amount from every merchant, give them a range of options from small to large dollar amounts.