March Matness 2016: #neckpull

An exercise called Neck Pull sounds kind of scary – right?  I agree but I can see where Joe thought the name fit the exercise.  The Neck Pull exercise really combines the Roll Up, the Spine Stretch,  and an added focus on lengthening(or pulling?) your neck.  I don’t especially love the “Pull” part of the name because it immediately makes me think of yanking or pulling on your neck which is not what we want.  Ideally the palms of the hands are putting just a slight pressure on the base of the skull that feels like you are creating length or tractioning the head away from the shoulders.  This lengthening of our neck really creates a sense of whole body work that engages us from the soles of our feet to the crown of our head.

Of course taking the hands behind the head like this also makes the exercise more challenging than just reaching arms in front of us like we do in Roll Up.  The Neck Pull exercise also challenges your core muscles by moving in a flat back spine for a portion of your getting your spine to the mat.

Tip:  If you find yourself jerking or trying to muscle through rolling up from the mat with your hands behind your head, use the arms reaching forward position during the roll up portion of the exercise.  You can place the hands behind the head before your roll up to your tall spine.  This will allow you to work on lengthening and strengthening the neck and core muscles on the first half of the exercise so you can eventually progress to keeping them behind your head the whole time.