Cupping Therapy Explained: An Ancient Technique That's Back in Sport

Every few years, a major sporting event turns into an accidental advert for cupping. Cameras zoom in on a swimmer's shoulders covered in neat purple circles, commentators explain, search interest spikes, and a technique that's thousands of years old trends all over again. Cupping has been a fixture of elite sport recovery rooms for the best part of a decade now, and it shows no sign of leaving. So what actually is it, where do those marks come from, and is it something an ordinary weekend exerciser should consider? Here's the full picture.

What Cupping Actually Is

Cupping is beautifully simple in principle: cups are placed on the skin and a vacuum is created inside them, so the skin and the superficial tissue beneath are drawn gently upward into the cup. Where massage presses tissue down and in, cupping pulls it up and out, which is why practitioners sometimes describe it as massage in reverse, decompression rather than compression.

Traditionally the vacuum was made with fire: a flame briefly heats the air inside a glass cup, the cup is placed on the skin, and the cooling air contracts to create suction. Modern practice more often uses silicone cups or plastic cups with a hand pump, which allow finer control. The cups stay in place for five to fifteen minutes, or, in "gliding" cupping, are moved slowly across oiled skin, covering a whole muscle group the way a massage stroke would.

An Old Technique With a Long Passport

Cupping's revival reads as a trend, but its history is remarkably deep and remarkably widespread. It appears in ancient Egyptian medical texts, in Greek medicine, across the Middle East as hijama, and most extensively in Traditional Chinese Medicine, where it has been practised for well over two thousand years. In the TCM framework, cupping belongs to the same family of thinking as Gua Sha and acupuncture: techniques applied along the body's meridians, traditionally understood to move stagnation and restore the free flow of Qi and blood, the tradition's recurring theme that flow is health and stuckness is the enemy.

Few techniques have been independently valued by so many cultures for so long. That's not proof of anything by modern standards, but it's a notable pedigree, and it's part of why cupping returned to fashion carrying more credibility than most wellness revivals.

Why Athletes Took It Up

Modern sport adopted cupping for reasons the tradition would recognise: recovery. Athletes and their therapists use it on hard-worked muscle groups, shoulders, backs, thighs, with the aim of easing tightness and supporting the recovery process between sessions. The suction draws blood into the treated area, and that increased local circulation is the mechanism most commonly pointed to, the same broad logic behind massage, foam rolling and warm-up itself: circulation is recovery's currency.

The honest scientific picture deserves stating plainly: research on cupping is mixed, studies are difficult to blind (everyone knows whether they've been cupped), and the strength of evidence doesn't yet match the strength of enthusiasm. Many athletes swear by how it makes their muscles feel; careful reviewers note the jury is still out on mechanisms and measurable effects. Both things are true at once, and anyone trying cupping should hold it the way elite recovery rooms mostly do: as one comfortable, low-risk tool among several, not a miracle.

About Those Purple Circles

The marks are the most famous and least understood part. They aren't bruises in the ordinary sense, no impact is involved. The suction draws blood to the surface and can break tiny capillaries, leaving the circular discolouration, which typically fades over several days to a week or so. In traditional practice the colour was even read as information about the state of the tissue beneath. Modern practitioners mainly treat it as a normal, temporary after-effect: painless, expected, and, at the Olympics at least, apparently something of a badge of honour.

Trying It Sensibly

If cupping appeals, the sensible route is a qualified practitioner, many sports massage therapists, physiotherapists and TCM practitioners offer it, often combined with massage. A first session typically feels like a strong, strange pulling, odd rather than painful, with most people describing the after-feeling as similar to a deep massage. Silicone home cupping sets exist and are popular, but a first experience is better guided than improvised, and cupping is best avoided over broken skin, varicose veins or any area with an active injury, and approached with advice if you have a circulatory condition or take blood-thinning medication.

It also stacks naturally with the rest of a recovery routine rather than replacing it. The gentle movement, sleep and load management we covered in our desk-bound recovery guide remain the foundations, and targeted topical support fits alongside: a cooling application like Biofrost Relief Gel for muscles that feel hot and hard-worked, or Biofrost Active where the dominant feeling is stiffness, its combination of cooling followed by warmth suiting the same tight, congested muscle state that sends athletes toward the cups in the first place.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does cupping therapy do?

The suction lifts skin and superficial tissue, drawing blood to the area. Traditionally it was used to move stagnation; in modern sport it's used with the aim of easing muscle tightness and supporting recovery, though research evidence remains mixed.

Does cupping hurt?

Most people describe strong pulling rather than pain, and an after-feeling similar to deep massage. Gliding cupping over oiled skin is gentler still.

How long do cupping marks last?

Typically a few days to around a week. They're caused by suction drawing blood to the surface, not by impact, and fading is normal.

Is cupping safe?

With a qualified practitioner it's generally considered low-risk. Avoid it over broken skin, varicose veins or acute injuries, and seek advice first if you have a circulatory condition or take blood-thinners.

Why do athletes use cupping?

As one recovery tool among many, aimed at hard-worked muscle groups, valued for how it makes muscles feel between sessions rather than backed by settled science.

Whether or not the cups are for you, the principle they represent, treating recovery as seriously as training, certainly is. Build the routine, and keep Biofrost in the kit bag for the muscles that earned it.