Save Your Back With Strong Glutes

Your glutes really are the seat of your power, and without strong glutes, your back tries to pick up the slack. Unfortunately, without strong glutes, your back can only do that with questionable body mechanics, and guess who suffers for it?

So instead…

The brain-butt connection

It might sound funny, but it’s true! Most squats don’t train the glutes through a proper neural connection; they over-recruit the quads and other nearby muscles, meaning the glutes have no reason to get stronger.

This trainer (Elisi Wolf)’s own lower-back injury (sacroiliac joint ligament tear) forced a shift away from traditional squats. That injury led to years of experimenting, and she found that Bulgarian split squats are different in this regard.

How they’re different: Bulgarian split squats reduce distractions to the brain, letting it build stronger neural pathways to the glutes, in contrast to how traditional squats divide focus between multiple large muscle groups and turn the movement into a calorie-burning, full-body effort rather than isolated glute training.

Additionally, because Bulgarian split squats use lighter weight and one leg at a time, they allow better control, slower reps, and more focused muscle engagement—all key for glute hypertrophy (and thus: strengthening).

For more on all of this, enjoy:

Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

Want to learn more?

You might also like:

Bulgarian Split Squats: How To Get The Best Glute Strength & Size ← this one details how, specifically, to do Bulgarian split squats correctly (and avoid common mistakes)

Take care!