Neck conditioning, sets and reps

I have posted elsewhere regarding my neck. I have stenosis of my cervical spine. I follow F1, H1 and all the stretch series. I want to add some neck conditioning. Due to my condition I think the safest option is to keep flexion and extension to a minimum and instead do static holds for time. I will use Thera bands rapped around my head and attached to my wall bars, side on, facing and away from the bars. 

What sets reps and time duration and frequency would you recommend please. Also any other advice would be gladly received. 

Hello Nick,

Good question.  

Personally I have not used static holds for neck work, but it should be a relatively easy transition.  For dynamic neck work I generally recommend 3x8-10r at the end of the day's training.  For the static work, I would simply count every 2s as a single rep.  Thus a single set would be somewhere between 16-20s minimum.  30s if you find that you prefer a higher rep range of 15r.

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

Thanks @Coach Sommer that sounds like a plan. I think a strong conditioned neck is vital for offering me more protection especially as I get older. As one Thera band gets easi I will use the next strength up. Thanks again @Coach Sommer

out of curiosity, what dynamic neck work have you used in the past coach?  i personally found just the headstands to do quite a bit for my neck and have been thinking about incorporating some more easy dynamic neck exercises as it is typically the most fragile part of the spine.

Hello Andrew,

My own athletes performed 1x10r of neck limbers as a part of their daily warmup.  

Neck Limbers are where the athlete squats down and places their head on the floor and then,with no hands, kicks over into a head bridge.  This is one rep.  Kicking back over to the starting position, again with no hands, is two reps.  And so on and so forth, until the athlete reaches 10r.

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

wow... okay that will have to be something to try way down the track I think...  did you just jump them straight into that once they were proficient at handstands and limbers or did they have some other sort of neck training to achieve this?

Hi Andrew, 

Building the proper neck strength is key. As you had mentioned in your previous post about working through headstands, this is excellent conditioning for the neck. 

Hi Andrew,

They just jumped right into them.  

It may help to remember however that I personally supervised their physical preparation from Day One.

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

Pretty hardcore. Without the right preparation this would be a great recipe for natural selection

@Nick Jones as a warm up for boxing we used to do simple nodding/rotating drills.
I don't know how severe your condition is, but they are good to engage basic rom, get some blood flowing in your neck and you can do them w/o equipment.
Laying on the floor, or even better a bench w your head hanging off the edge, keep nodding, rotating l to r for a few minutes. In between, hold your head at the end position(s) for an extended period of time. That'll bring extra joy and your jaw muscles will start feeling real funny too.
 

Thanks @Bas Albinus that is similar to what I used to do before my neck issue and definitely works. At this point I can get a flare up doing this supine position. I am sure though that as I get stronger I will return to these.

Interstingly as I improved shoulder flexion and extension and get better at scap push-ups the whole musculature in the thoracic area is getting stronger and more conditioned this then helps my neck. Also the improving mobility decreases any forward head posture

Hi Nick,

Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents here. I think a key component to neck stability exercise is the awareness of the deep neck muscles as well as the larger (global) neck muscles. One way to gain awareness of these stabilizing muscles is by lightly making a double chin while pressing your tongue into the roof of your mouth rather hard. You should feel a deep fatigue in the front of your neck after holding, and the space behind your chin/ between your mandibles will harden. This indicates you are activating your deep neck flexor muscles. You can try to activate these during your static holds and during any dynamic movements as Bas suggested, taking care to be mindful of how your neck feels. 

This was a common thread that I got from multiple PT's after I had a neck injury playing rugby in college. An MRI revealed damage to my cervical discs- great news to hear in your twenties. Anyhow, I keep my hopes up that, without re-injury, sufficient and proper movement should get my neck close to new eventually. Best of luck to you!

H

Thanks @Henry Madsen that is very good advice. In fact you have jogged my memory. I was diagnosed with cervical stenosis and to bulging discs about 10 years ago. When searching for methods to help me I used a chek practitioner who was awesome. We pretty much worked every thing except my neck as it would react badly. However slowly but sure my symptoms have decreased. They will probably never be completely gone the stenosis remains.

Howevr he did say that one day I may be able to do the exercise you described above. He suggested laying supine with a blood pressure cuff place under the neck inflated. You woul then do the double chin move and get a reading on any pressure increase you cause. Not to much and not to little 

Pretty cool

Thanks