even my graston person, whom i didn’t see for many years, told me she has changed from giving what i call the “graston beat down” where the tools just leave bruises all over you, to less bruising, more effective fascial treatments. she told me the entire graston community is changing to less bruising.

i know that Kstarr and Roop say spend at least X minutes on something.  i think you need to approach that with modifications to your personal situation. you need to be able to adjust the pressure and know when to stop.  if you find that some tissue is still sore and you can’t get it to release today after a minute or two, i’d consider stopping and giving the tissue some time to rest and recover from the smashing, and then go at it again tomorrow.  as long as you have worked it, you have done work on the tissues. but you must be patient to let the tissue come back to health and get all of the restrictions and adhesions worked out. it can take a single session; it might take months. You may not need all of the X minutes that Kstarr/Roop recommend to release the tissue.

ART and Graston professionals are trained to know when to stop. The bad ones don’t know when to stop and can’t feel when the tissue has changed.  I think self smashers need to develop the same intuition and sensitivity.

Besides, if you overwork tissues and they have experienced real trauma, then you have to also heal the trauma to recover.  in addition to that, you may not be able to work out the next day because you’re so sore from the smashing, whereas you might have recovered if you had not smashed so vigorously.

other things to consider – to recover from smashing and your workouts, you should be eating high quality protein and fats. the usual recommendation is 1g of protein per lb of body weight. this should help you recover a lot faster.