Overhead press? Deadlift? I’ve been using a neck harness but i’m getting sick of it and my neck is always stiff. In your experience does pencil neck syndrome disappear as people get overall strong / jacked from doing enough volume on the main lifts? Thinking about getting the press template especially if it can help with this goal.
Theoretically, the only exercises that will improve neck musculature strength and size are exercises that directly load the neck musculature - i.e., not the barbell movements. Training with a barbell and gaining overall size might take others’ attention away from your Pencil Neck Syndrome, though.
I don’t know the specifics of your neck training program, but you might want to take a closer look at how it is organized if this is happening. I’ve been training my neck, and programming neck work for a few clients, for several months now. Training neck flexion and extension 2-3x/wk with low-moderate volume per session (3x15 on each movement) has worked fairly well and minimized soreness - which was something we noticed a lot when programming a 1x/wk frequency with high volume per session. I also noticed that gently trying to move my neck through a full active ROM after neck training sessions and on rest days helped me minimize stiffness/soreness to maintain full ROM (think like how you’d slowly try to squat deeper to warm-up for squats, but using this approach on all of the neck movements [flexion, extension, right lateral flexion, left lateral flexion, right rotation, left rotation]).
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Thanks for the detailed response! I have been taking the intensity a bit far lately to the point where im using my abs a bit on lying neck flexion instead of just stopping. I also havnt been sticking to the most consistent schedule with it. Will definately try your reccomendation
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I began training my neck with a leather neck harness after 3-4 years of consistent neck pain (probably due to pro-wrestling and various other sources of stress) and I experienced an enormous reduction in felt soreness and stiffness. Cause and effect? Who can say? Pain is complex phenomena. It is bio-psycho-social, as they say. It’s possible that challenging my neck to move weight gave my brain/mind a sort of confidence in the health of my neck which removed the pain response. Watching my neck get bigger and stronger may have also played a role. That said, my experience should at least provide some reassurance there isn’t a necessary, causal relationship between training with a neck harness and experiencing neck pain and stiffness. I began with a 35lb dumbbell and eventually moved to a 62lb dumbbell for 3-5 sets of 20-25 3-5x per week. I’ve also done 2 minute timed sets for AMRAP.