THERE'S THE RUB

At the World Championship in Massage, no body is left behind.

- BY SARAH LARSON

The moment when a massage begins, for both practitioner and receiver, has a sacred quality. The initial touch marks the transition from regular life—chitchat, logistics, social armor—to the otherworldly realm of the massage, in which mind and body are uniquely harmonized, and some kind of euphoria is achieved. It's also a transfer of power, in which the receiver willingly becomes vulnerable to the practitioner. If the first touch feels off, you won't relax. If you don't relax, you won't have a good massage.

For the average person, being massaged in a public space, as part of a competition, might be a relaxation-proof challenge. But one Saturday morning in June, in Copenhagen, I found myself in a classroom filled with twelve massage tables, around which massage therapists from across the world prepared to ply their trade on their receivers, or “body models,” in front of an audience. Kiyah Edwards, a former nurse’s assistant from Florida and a mother of four, stood in an American-flag-print bodysuit alongside a classroom skeleton. Krista Harris, a massage and yoga instructor who has performed with circus groups, had assembled a metal structure that she’d brought from Atlanta, and hung it with hammock-like fabrics. (“My husband and I run drills,” she told me.) A newcomer, Landon Gallant, based in Denver, wore a feather in his hair and stood beside a life-size poster of himself, both Landons glowering. The poster listed his massage credentials and some accomplishments—“Fear Factor” contestant, batboy to Michael Jordan.

In America, especially, massage has been in high demand since the pandemic.