This Arizona massage instructor created a championship to turn his art into a competitive sport

There are lots of things we're used to seeing in competition: Sports, of course. Car racing. Now, baking. But what about massage?

Well, it turns out professional massage therapists all over the country are holding championships these days. John Sanders started it all right here in Phoenix.

Sanders is a massage instructor and owner of his own massage practice: Mind, Body and Balance Massage by John. He’s the director of the annual Arizona Massage Championship and Showcase.

This year will be their fifth competition — held Nov. 1, 2025, at the Southwest Institute of Healing Arts in Tempe.

The Show spoke with Sanders more about it and asked where the idea of a massage championship began.

Full conversation

JOHN SANDERS: In my old school, Arizona School of Massage Therapy, we would — we, meaning the instructors — we would treat our students to demonstrations where there was no script, we would just do what we do, and the students oohed and ahhed on what they saw. And then it later progressed into bringing some of our advanced students to demonstrate, and then it led to us inviting some of the spas, the local spas, to have a representative come in and show what they do.

And it became a big deal for our students. Our students loved it. Our day students, night students, they really looked forward to it.

LAUREN GILGER: So students really liked watching someone else give the massage. And this is because it sounds like there are many more ways to do a massage than we might assume.

SANDERS: Oh yeah. When I came into the industry, there was 171 different modalities. There's close to 400 now. There's so many different techniques. And so when you do a championship, there's no telling what you're going to see. And people will combine different techniques and modalities and make it look like something brand new. So it's awesome.

GILGER: That's really cool. What kinds of techniques, what kinds of modalities? Like I know about hot stone massages and Swedish massages, but what else is there out there?

SANDERS: Well, there is Thai massage. And you know, right now in our cities all across the United States, the stretch in industry is huge. So when you combine Swedish with deep tissue, hot stone and stretch therapies, you have something that's very unique, and it caters to the people that want a nice relaxing massage as well as those that really want to feel their massage.

GILGER: Yeah, yeah, some people definitely do. OK, so you go from demonstrations with your students to launching the first kind of competition, like a championship in terms of massage in the state.

SANDERS: The current school I work at now, Southwest Institute of Healing Arts in Tempe, I was invited to a meeting and the owner, KC Miller said, "Does anybody have any ideas how to promote our massage program?" And right away, without even thinking, I said, "Let's do a massage championship." She stared at me for a second and said, "OK, do it."

And we did it. I put out some advertisement. We had a group of therapists come in, and it actually went very well. It was scaled back compared to what it is now, but it was awesome. And we've been doing it ever since.

GILGER: OK, so let's talk about what a massage championship looks like, because this is not something we think about as like a competition, a competitive sport at all, right? How does this work? Like, what are the categories to begin with?

SANDERS: So if you go to other championships that exist now, they have Swedish categories, facial categories, sports categories, chair massage categories. They have Thai massage categories. Here in Arizona, we basically have a clothed category and an unclothed category. The unclothed is basically your typical Swedish massage, getting under the sheet and with draping. The clothed modality, you will see a lot more stretching. And people are wearing clothes, but we're still manipulating their muscles, and it's massage.

GILGER: That's interesting. OK, so that's the categories. What about how you judge something like this?

Handout

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John Sanders

SANDERS: So we judge on a few things. One is your technique. Are you utilizing the basic hand positions: effleurage, petrissage, compression, friction, vibration.

Then we judge on flow. And flow is the connectivity as you move from one body part to another. Some therapists struggle with flow. They're sort of choppy, they're here to here. But the really talented massage therapists, it almost looks like they're in a dance, a coordinated dance, and that flow is important.

Then the other is ergonomics, which is basically your body mechanics, how you move through and around the table or on the mat, which is one of the main reasons I got into massage, because if you don't have really good body mechanics, you can still give a really good massage. But you, the therapist, you're going to hurt.

GILGER: Interesting.

SANDERS: It's going to hurt your neck, your shoulders, your back. But when you learn to the flow and the technique of really good transition, it almost looks like you're dancing with your client.

And there's something that happens during a massage championship. There's this energy in the room when everyone's doing their own thing all together, it is palpable. You can feel it. And it sometimes makes people emotional. And especially when you watch a really talented massage therapists glide and sort of dance with their client, it's a feeling that you don't ever get in a classroom. So feeling that I never felt until we did our massage championship.

GILGER: That's fascinating. OK, so you've got a room full of, is it table after table after table?

SANDERS: Table after table after table.

GILGER: OK. And I'm sure music, etc., judges walking throughout.

SANDERS: Judges walking around with their little clipboard. They go with the IMA, which is the International Massage Association scorecard. And if they see something they like, judges will give them a notch up. If they see something they don't like, give them a notch down. They get together, formulate their scores and boom, we have a winner.

GILGER: My goodness. OK, so this has really taken off across the country since you started this here in Arizona, right?

SANDERS: Yes, yes. And you know what? It was never my intention. My intention was just to do it for Southwest Institute of Healing Arts and to promote massage there. But the Europeans have been doing massage championships for a number of years all across Europe, Canada, Mexico. I've got friends that compete in Norway, Romania.

GILGER: So, yeah, like, describe what this looks like for us. What's the kind of the coolest thing you've ever seen someone do in a really great massage in one of these competitions?

SANDERS: Oh, man. You know, one of the categories is innovation. And with innovation, some people use tools. You've heard of cupping, right?

GILGER: Yep.

SANDERS: You've heard of bamboo sticks, hot stones?

GILGER: Sure.

SANDERS: Well, some of the tools that, that people have created are just out of this world. Hula hoops, battery operated things. In every championship, every year, someone comes out with a new tool. Sometimes people use fire. We don't allow fire in our thing.

GILGER: Sometimes people use fire!

SANDERS: In their cups. They put flames in their fire.

GILGER: OK, OK.

SANDERS: It's very different, but the tools and the innovation is very interesting. It's not for everyone. Sometimes you'll see things that you won't see at a normal spa.

GILGER: Yeah. So you've got almost a show aspect to some of this, it sounds like now.

SANDERS: Very much so, very much. You know, if you're a client, wonder what's out there, you need to come to a massage championship because you're gonna see so many different things.

GILGER: So I wonder this. John, just talking to you about the world of massage and how vast it is and how kind of technical and professional it can be, do you think we're thinking about massage all wrong in this country? Like, is it more of an art to you? Is it a service? Is it a sport?

SANDERS: I say massage is an art, especially when you do it beautifully with perfect body mechanics. You're innovative, mixing all the different modalities. I've heard many massage therapists considering what they do art.