Soychadcell
Chadlite or suicide. Trying to look classy
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I am aware that there are multiple threads on here that talk about neck training and the importance of a developed neck so I will keep the introduction short and focuse on changing your training plan for the better.
By now most of us understand the importance of a well trained neck. Not only does it do incredible things for harmony and dimorphism, no matter your phenotype, it gets especially important when we age and start to look more masculine. If you see any pretty boy age, you will see that the wuality of his appearence at a more mature age is linked to the width of his neck more often then not.
Put Pictures in the comments if you want.
To get all the benefits of a nice neck, you should optimize your training, while most people see some results doing neck curls alone, faster and more aesthetic results can be achieved.
The main muscle driving dimorphism and definition of the neck is the musculus sternocleidomastoideus. as the name suggests, we have not one but two points of origin (the non moving end of the muscle) inserting at the same end.
The insertion (attatchement of the muscle at the moving end) is the mastoid process for both heads, how ever the lateral ( outer ) head of the muscle originates at the medial (inner) head of the clavicula while the medial head originates at the sternum. Compearable to the pectoralis muscle ( cest ), each heads fibres striation and therefor direction of contraction differs, making each head perform more work during different movements.
The medial/sternal head is mainly responsible for frontal flexion (the movement found in neck curls), while the lateral/calvicular head is mainly responsible for side flexion and side rotation of the head.
Since the lateral head makes up most of the muscle and grows towards the outside much more, its more important to hit this head then the inner head
if we want to improve the ratio of bigonail width to neck width wich is most important.
RESULTS:
Accepting this, we must start to prefer muscles that isolate or include the lateral/calvicular head as more then a supporting muscle. In order to do this, our movements need to include side flexion or side rotation.
To perform exercises including these movement patterns, a head harness is prefered as it makes it very stable and easy to load the head targeted.
See Side flexion. I could not find a good picture for rotations, proving this is still niche. Just lay down on your back on a bench, your head and neck over the end, then twistyour neck unde rload of the harnes and simultainiously move up your chin. The combination of these movements should let you end up moving your chin to your shoulder and activating both theclavicular and sternal head.This should make neck curls obsolete.
IF YOU ARE NO OWNER OF A NECK HARNESS
I would advice you to still perform weighted neck curls, as it is the easiest exercise to overload progressivly without having to worry about setup and stability. To do this, lay down on a bench, head and neck over the end, place weight plates on your fore head and curl up and down, full range of motion.
I highly advice you to add weighted lateral flexion though, this is arguably the more important exercise. To do this, lay your side on a bench head and neck hanging over , use a weight plate and put it on your temple, then curl it up sideways, full ROM.
I personally have stability and overloading issues with this exercise so I use a resistance band instead and perform standing neck rotations.
Attatch the resistance band on head hight, stand sideways to your attatchement point,put it around your upper head and rotate your neck in the opposite side. Simultainiously look at your shoulder to add lateral flexion.
For all the metioned exercises, reps and sets simmelar to other small muscles are adviced.
I would adicve 3x15 to failure every second day since the muscle recovers fast and doesnt need much load.
I personally do supersets of weighted neck curls and side rotations with a band to save time.
You can find videos of all exercises on youtube.
Have fun and a good necktraining
By now most of us understand the importance of a well trained neck. Not only does it do incredible things for harmony and dimorphism, no matter your phenotype, it gets especially important when we age and start to look more masculine. If you see any pretty boy age, you will see that the wuality of his appearence at a more mature age is linked to the width of his neck more often then not.
Put Pictures in the comments if you want.
To get all the benefits of a nice neck, you should optimize your training, while most people see some results doing neck curls alone, faster and more aesthetic results can be achieved.
The main muscle driving dimorphism and definition of the neck is the musculus sternocleidomastoideus. as the name suggests, we have not one but two points of origin (the non moving end of the muscle) inserting at the same end.
The insertion (attatchement of the muscle at the moving end) is the mastoid process for both heads, how ever the lateral ( outer ) head of the muscle originates at the medial (inner) head of the clavicula while the medial head originates at the sternum. Compearable to the pectoralis muscle ( cest ), each heads fibres striation and therefor direction of contraction differs, making each head perform more work during different movements.
The medial/sternal head is mainly responsible for frontal flexion (the movement found in neck curls), while the lateral/calvicular head is mainly responsible for side flexion and side rotation of the head.
Since the lateral head makes up most of the muscle and grows towards the outside much more, its more important to hit this head then the inner head
if we want to improve the ratio of bigonail width to neck width wich is most important.
RESULTS:
Accepting this, we must start to prefer muscles that isolate or include the lateral/calvicular head as more then a supporting muscle. In order to do this, our movements need to include side flexion or side rotation.
To perform exercises including these movement patterns, a head harness is prefered as it makes it very stable and easy to load the head targeted.
IF YOU ARE NO OWNER OF A NECK HARNESS
I would advice you to still perform weighted neck curls, as it is the easiest exercise to overload progressivly without having to worry about setup and stability. To do this, lay down on a bench, head and neck over the end, place weight plates on your fore head and curl up and down, full range of motion.
I highly advice you to add weighted lateral flexion though, this is arguably the more important exercise. To do this, lay your side on a bench head and neck hanging over , use a weight plate and put it on your temple, then curl it up sideways, full ROM.
I personally have stability and overloading issues with this exercise so I use a resistance band instead and perform standing neck rotations.
Attatch the resistance band on head hight, stand sideways to your attatchement point,put it around your upper head and rotate your neck in the opposite side. Simultainiously look at your shoulder to add lateral flexion.
For all the metioned exercises, reps and sets simmelar to other small muscles are adviced.
I would adicve 3x15 to failure every second day since the muscle recovers fast and doesnt need much load.
I personally do supersets of weighted neck curls and side rotations with a band to save time.
You can find videos of all exercises on youtube.
Have fun and a good necktraining
)
