Is it good to do HighBar squats after dead’s? I do it for emphasis on legs plus reducing work on the hips. I’m 40 sometimes my back goes out. And I do a squat variation after dead’s. Usually around 70%-80% of Monday’s Squat. My back goes out because my hips get tight.
Hey Steven,
Thanks for the post and for registering on the forum. There are a few different issues here that I’d like to address. Let’s start with the squats
High Bar Squats
If you want to do squats after deadlifts, that’s fine as part of an intelligently planned program. Additionally, there are no appreciable differences between these two squat variations as far as muscle activation of the legs, hips, or back. Sure, some individuals may squat more weight using low bar, but this doesn’t increase the amount of muscle mass being used. Rather, the mechanics of the lift change to allow similar amounts of muscle mass to produce more force due to improved leverages.
As far as if it’s “good” or not, that depends more on the whole program. If you’re a low bar squatter and then trying to high bar 70-80% of that, the relative intensity might be much higher, which is one of the limitations to using straight percentages. That said, we program squats (or other leg work) after deadlifts in many of our programs so yes, it can be done!
Back, Age, etc.
I’m not sure what you mean when you say your “back goes out” but I assume you’re saying that you have back pain sometimes. That is not unusual, however we would want to avoid that as it can negatively impact your life and training. It is likely that the back pain you experience from training is due to a rapid increase in training fatigue that you weren’t prepared for. We would advise reducing RPE and volume towards something more manageable and gradually working up over time. Your age doesn’t make a meaningful difference here. Additionally, your hips getting “tight” are unlikely to cause any symptoms with your back other than potentially indicating you’re becoming fatigued. We would try to reframe this narrative about being old, your back going out, and having tight hips into something like “You’re healthy, resilient, powerful, and may need to adjust some programming variables to better suit your current level of training.” 
2 Likes
Thanks man. I was not expecting something that in depth. That was awesome dude! It’s fun that the same muscle activation is happening in both style of squats. I’m gonna have to do some thinking on the programming (although the high bars are fun). My hips do get super wigged out sometimes. I stopped using my belt to force my weight down. I feel 400 lb squats are not necessary for general health, so I lowered everything and put the belt away. While the belt engages the abs more it may not help the back stronger. I flip flop on that but for now that’s how I feel about it. Thanks again dude! I’m so use to sarcastic responses from another site.
Some thoughts on the lifting belt:
