I had a pretty bad lower lat strain, probably from sumo DLs, but I thought it might have been a disc injury as it was low on my back. Well, it should go without saying that having a hurt back really sucks. It hurts to do anything strenuous. It made me rethink my my priorities. I was trying to work my way up to a 3x bw squat and dl, but now I don't think it's worth a life time of back pain. So I switched it up and now I try to minimize lower back loading. I do single leg squats (pistols) for high reps, glute ham raises, and a bunch of single leg extensions for lower body development instead of maximal squats and DLs. I'm actually seeing better hypertrophy, and I don't get the same kind of crippling soreness either. For upper body I switched away from heavy weighted dips pullups and presses and now I do almost exclusively bw exercises: planches, levers, freestanding hand stand pushups. Hopefully I can minimize my risk of injury by avoiding carrying so much weight.
