The Best Small Massage Gun: Blackroll Fascia Gun Review
Sportitude's in-house running expert Josh Willoughby reviews the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun, an essential tool in your recovery kit and the best small massage gun to get in your hands in 2022.
The benefits of recovery should never be undervalued at any stage of your fitness or running journey. An effective recovery plan can boost your performance, overall health and wellbeing – but it’s only as good as the nutrition you take, and the massage & recovery tools you use.
Time can be barrier to prioritising your recovery – making recovery tools like the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun indispensable in their ability to provide muscle activation pre-workout as part of your warm up, and release muscle tension post-workout quickly and effectively.
As the experts in recovery, Blackroll is our go-to brand for taking care of every muscle with their range of high-quality foam rollers and now, the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun.
Complementing our guide on Everything You Need To Know About Massage Guns, in this review Josh will discuss where a massage gun fits into your recovery routine and highlight the features that make the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun stand out from the pack.
As one of the quietest small massage guns on the market, the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun is a worthy addition to your home gym and your recovery on-the-go.
Check out the review with full transcript below.
Hey guys, Josh here from Sportitude Running. I'm down in one of our RunDNA fitting studios on the shop floor at Sportitude Running Hindmarsh and we're going to do a review today.
This review is a little bit different. We obviously love to give you shoe reviews but this one is going to be all about the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun. There are a lot of massage guns on the market, let's not beat around the bush, but this product is unique in its design and capabilities. It's one of our favourites here in-store at Sportitude.
What's The Purpose Of A Massage Gun?
To give you context around massage guns, there's a bit of confusion about what's the purpose of them. Most people would probably use massage guns to potentially replace a massage. However, that's not the case. Massage guns are a phenomenal recovery tool and are a remarkable success when someone is looking to take their training and their body management to the next level.
It can be used pre an exercise campaign, after going for a run, nighttime or when you wake up in the morning. Anytime you want to increase blood circulation to get that performance benefit, have a look at your Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun and see if you can take your training and your recovery to the next level.
Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun: What's In The Box?
In this little box we have quite the setup. There’s the massage gun itself which is quite small and it comes with four different interchangeable heads. I’ll go through them one by one.
Silicon Ball: We have the silicon ball which is your traditional massage ball. It’s rather small, however this is your full-body massage head. This is where you can attack any part of your body and get the benefit of the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun.
Silicone Trigger: The next interchangeable head would be the trigger point. Again, it has a silicon head on the end so it's relatively soft. Like its namesake, it’s your trigger point massage head. It’s ideal for targeting your glutes, hips, hip flexors and those deeper tissues where you want to get inside that muscle to relieve pressure, tension and increase circulation.
Silicon Fork: The other probably more popular attachment is the silicon fork. Again, it has silicon heads on top so it’s nice and soft. This is for your parallel muscle groups like your calf muscles, either side of your Achilles tendon coming up towards where the soleus sits in your lower leg and your trapezius (traps muscle) behind your shoulders. It’s a really versatile head.
Metal Flat: The next attachment is not the most popular however it's great just to round off what you get out of this massage gun. It has a metal head with flat base. This is ideal for when you're looking for gentle massage and you want to increase the surface area across the skin, so it's not as targeted as you would get with the trigger point, parallel silicon fork or your silicon ball. Increasing the surface area on a lighter RPM gives you a gentle massage on those key areas.
Why You'll Love The Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun
Last but not least, let's get out the massage unit itself. As I touched on in the intro, the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun is relatively small. This massage has a rechargeable lithium battery, and it comes with USB-C capabilities for your rechargeable purposes.
It can be dialled in to four different speeds. The great thing about those four different speeds is they vary from 1200 RPM to 3200 RPM, so you have really good variance regarding how much targeted penetration you want with your massage.
I'll show you how easy it is to set up. I'll grab the more popular silicon ball that literally sits inside the hole at the top. Simply push until you feel the tension release and then hold down the button at the bottom, and we are firing. If you hold the button down for two seconds, it turns it off.
Probably the best benefit of the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun is that it’s not only small, but it’s relatively quiet. Being so quiet you can sit there and still watch TV with friends or family and you're not going to be interrupting the movie with everyone else around you. It’s also a fantastic size to take to your office and use at work as well.
Another benefit of being so small is it's a good travel size. It's not going to take up much of your luggage space in your bag. It comes in a box with foam on the inside to package it all up and take it across the world, interstate, domestically or wherever you're going with your massage gun. The Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun will go with you.
The Wrap Up
As I touched on in the intro, massage guns are great for your recovery and that is exactly what this little guy is for. It’s to take your training to the next level by making sure that you get every single part of your fascia covered with the four different heads and the four different speeds in a little, light and quiet package.
If you haven't jumped onto Blackroll to check the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun out, I would encourage you to do so.
The best thing about it is on the side of this box it has a QR code that will take you through to targeted training videos from Blackroll on how to use all different heads for all different purposes. It's fantastic, they're not only offering an excellent product they're backing it up with education as well.
There you have it, that is the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun, available in store at Sportitude Hindmarsh and online at Sportitude Running.
FEATURES
Compared to competitors in the small massage gun space, the Blackroll Fascia Massage Gun offers the following features:
- Longest battery life (up to 15 hours)
- Largest frequency range from 1200 RPM (lowest in market for true relaxation) to 3200 RPM
- Most powerful compact gun (strongest motor)
- Lightest and smallest design (travel-friendly)
- Made from Aerospace aluminium
- 4 x Massage attachments
- Quietest operation
SPECIFICATIONS
Size & Material
- Weight: 544g
- Dimensions: 140mm x 87mm x 48mm
- Material: Aerospace aluminium alloy (sturdy built)
Functionality
- Stall Force: 14.5kg / 33.86lbs (most powerful small massage gun)
- Amplitude: 7.55mm
- Speed: 4 Frequency Levels: 1200 RPM, 1700 RPM, 2700 RPM, 3200 RPM
- Noise Level: 55 - 65 decibels (virtually silent)
Battery
- Battery Type: 2600 mAh Lithium-Ion battery
- Battery Life: Up to 15 hours
- Charging: USB-C charging port
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