Description
This is a progression to the deep neck flexor activation exercise. The video for deep neck flexor activation is below for your convenience. It is a good one to review prior to doing this.
The “chin tuck with head lift” exercise is an exercise that is intended to strengthen all of your neck flexors. Since the deep neck flexors tend to be weak and inhibited, extra emphasis is placed on the proper cuing of these muscles during this exercise.
Deep Neck Flexor Activation (Review)
This is a good one to review prior to performing the main exercise (chin tuck with head lift).
You can read more about deep neck flexor activation here.
What you should feel during the Chin Tuck with Head Lift
This exercise is generally very challenging! You should feel nearly all the muscles in the front of your neck working hard. One of the most important components to this exercise is engagement of the deep neck flexors, which are located deep in the front of your neck, behind your trachea (windpipe) and in front of the spine. You should feel these muscles working, as well as some of the other muscles around your neck like the SCM muscle.
Chin Tuck with Head Lift
Instructions
Here are the instructions and there is a video below that explains it all:
- Lie down on your back
- Perform the chin tuck (watch video above or go to deep neck flexor activation page to learn more)
- Now lift your entire head off the table by no more than 1 inch, while maintaining the chin tuck / deep neck flexor activation.
- Hold this position for the specified time / until fatigue.
Remember, you need to take a break if you start losing the chin tuck (chin starts tipping up) and/or you feel like the deep neck flexors are failing due to fatigue.
Parameters
mdkPHYSIO provides specific parameters to all patients. In most cases we start this exercise performing 3 repetitions and holding each repetition for as long as possible, one time per day.
