Bar placement with wide stance squats

[100whey]

Hi there I've been doing wide stance squats with a high bar placement. I've read in lots of places that when doing wide stance squats you must have the bar placed lower down your traps. I have not been able to come across a reason for this though. Is it alright to do wide stance squats with a high bar placement and if not then why?

[eLvarouza]

The point of the wide stance is to engage the posterior chain more, since the knees come forward less and the adductors and hamstrings contribute more to the movement. Using a low bar position flexes the hip more, further involving the posterior chain. So why would you want to do wide stance squats with a high bar placement in the first place?

[LiftingNerd]

What do you consider a wide stance squat? My wide stance has my feet pretty much touching either side of the power rack. If you are keeping the bar higher on your traps you should then also be standing more upright to reduce the force being put on your lower back. I can't even force myself into that position as you can't sit back, you must go straight down. Now if you kept the bar high on your traps and maintained the same hip angle as you would with a low bar squat you could do it. You'd just be putting more force on your lower back, which would limit the amount of weight used, and make doing the exercise pretty worthless.

[Westsider]

Lower bar placement will keep the bar closer to your centre of gravity which should help you balance it more. However if you keep the bar too low your back won't be able to take the strain and you'll dump the weight forward. Find a bar position that you feel the strongest and most comfortable with is my opinion. Don't worry too much about the muscles that are stressed since when you squat wide your are involving more of the hips and hamstrings anyway which is good. If you feel awful squatting with a lowbar position then don't do it because you will feel even worse when you go for a max and could possibly injure yourself. We are all built differently so we must all adjust our squatting style to suit us best. To me wide stance squats would be like the ones we see from Chuck Vogelpohl, Vlad Alhazov or Donnie Thompson whereas a close stance would be the ones we see from Kirk Karwoski.

If you feel comfortable with a high bar position then go for it.