It isn’t a mystery that posture and the way you carry yourself has a large effect on your outlook on life, your ease of movement and your ability to be less fatigued. But what about fitness?

Many personal trainers, coaches and trainees tend to overlook seemingly minor flaws in form during exercises because they likely do not see the correlation with how proper alignment of the joints during movement can have a profoud effect on the performance of that activity. Long term, this also promotes more awareness of the body’s structure, limits the likelihood of injury and increases performance. In this blog, i’d like to prove to you how simple positioning of the head and neck, as an example, has a profound effect on strength and function during movement.

photo from http://neckpainsupport.typepad.com/.a/6a010534db265a970c011570527775970b-800wi

This all may seem anecdotal at this point in my argument, however, after revisiting a favorite book of mine titled “Supertraining” by Dr. Mel Siff PhD, i was reminded again about the awesome powers of proper alignment and how it positively correlates with improved strength and safety during movement.

“The position of the head has a powerful effect on overall posture, particularly during standing and sitting activities…Flexion of the neck casuses a reflex relaxation of the erector muscles, which is potentially dangerous for resisted lifting movements such as squatting, cleaning and deadlifting.” (Siff, p.153)

I will also add that cervical hyper-extension also causes not only compression of the cervical vertebrae, but also distorts the other curves of the spine during activities such as the barbell good morning, squatting or deadlifting patterns. One must learn to position the head neutrally by activating the deep neck flexors. Also, many will exhibit poor extension in the thoracic spine, likely due to long hours of sitting in flexion. This will likely need to be adressed first before any work in the neck is done. Here’s a great video of learning how to position the head and neck, called the chin-tuck:

Teaching the Chin tuck for good head/neck alignment

It may seem simple and silly to perform, however, learning how to keep a neutral head and neck position during workouts is essential for engaging the right muscles, increasing performance, and keeping the spine nice and healthy!

Charlie Reid Uncategorized