Hip Pain Following Long Turning Sessions

YSB does use what's called 'Scissor Thigh' Stepping where as you step around the circle your thighs rub together as if they were a pair of scissors, BUT, and this is very important point, this will only happen if you have really huge thigh muscles, (which can develop from a lot of circle turning). So a lot of Bagua people around the world try to rub their really skinny thighs together but it's more like 'Scissor Knee or scissor feet stepping' and the crucial point in YSB is that there should always be a fists width between your two feet at all times while walking around the circle. If you make a tight fist it should be about 2.5 Cun, a Cun is a unit of measurement that is unique to your own body.

Following this rule could help you. I know that I've had some pain in the past by trying to walk along a single line instead of having each foot on it's own track, like a train track.

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Matt,

I am no doctor and certainly cannot speak to your particular condition nor pain.
I can, however, tell you about my own experience of joint pain in the legs while turning.

In my experience, two things potentially aggravate the joints: degree of difficulty and improper motion.

In general, the longer & lower one turns as well as the fewer steps per circle, the more demanding the turning practice can be on the joints in the legs. Demanding is not necessarily a bad thing; these are all good means of increasing intensity and gaining development. Still, one needs to be careful to increase difficulty gradually and one needs to allow ample time for recovery. If you have a brutally intense turning session, you likely won't be physically able to turn the same way the following day.

It's easy for improper motion to occur in the joints of the legs and this is especially true as one increases the length of time, not only creating more opportunities for improper movement but also because one's attention may waver more over a prolonged period. In the past, I have rarely had ankle pain from turning, but hip and especially knee pain have been more common. What I have found is that this is often due to improper movement in my legs. When I have had knee pain, it was sometimes due to failing to extend the front leg far enough when I step and sometimes due to the strain of overdriving with the back leg. I find that regardless, I need to regularly stretch my knees after (and ideally also before) long turning sessions (even a few minutes of sitting on my heels makes a huge difference).

Also, for all three large joints in each leg, it is important that they are continually altering between closing off and opening. As one walks around the circle, one hooks & swings the foot open; actually, the motion should be done with the entirety of the leg from the foot through the ankle & knee all the way up to the hip (as one hook steps, the large joints of both legs circularly close inwards and as one open steps, they all open circularly outwards). While this motion is most pronounced in 4 step circles, it should be present in the 6 step circles as well. If one is unaware of this opening & closing of the joints or forgets about it, it's easy for the odd angles created by the feet to cause strain somewhere higher in the leg (likely in whichever joint that happens to be stiffer than the others).

Furthermore, we do not tight rope the circle nor is the circle a circular tight rope, rather, we walk circularly. Think of the circle as a circular line that divides the two feet such that the outside foot steps just outside the circle and the inside foot steps just inside the circle. If the feet are placed in a fashion somewhat funky (on the same line, too far apart and/or with unequal amounts of twist) relative to one another, this can also cause strain in the joints.

So all I can recommend is this:
1. Give yourself sufficient recovery time. Let the pain go away before you persist in the method.

2. Build in sufficient future recovery time. If you originally turned 4-5 days a week for 1 hour each time, turning 1.5 hours each time is a significant increase (you are effectively adding another 2+ days per week of turning into your sessions). So either alternate between 1.5 hours and 1 hour, or alternate between one day turning 1.5 hours and one day rest. Do this until you become physically accustomed to the increased duration; only then can you productively ponder how to further increase the difficulty. Remember, development comes from becoming accustomed to higher difficulty. Endlessly maintaining the same difficulty is therefore not an option, but increasing the difficulty is only productive if you allow your body the opportunity to become accustomed to it. Increase without accustomization = injury.

3. Make sure your joints are moving properly and check the placement of your feet relative to one another. Incorrect motion causes a lot of unnecessary pain, especially in an activity with high repetition of movement like turning.

4. If the pain won't go away even after one has ceased turning for a number of days, consider seeking a medical professional.

- Eric

P.s.: Your description of standing at zishi is awesome. Someday I hope to try it.

I don't know if this will be helpful to you in your particular situation, but you could try using a black foam roller to iron out your IT bands in your legs. That helped loosen up mine marvelously, from knee to hip, and I noticed a positive difference in my circle-walking.

I'm not an expert though, and if you have a tear you'll probably want to ask someone more knowledgeable than me as to whether or not it's a good idea for you. I'm just sharing something that had a positive impact for me. My issue was largely low back pain, but it occurred to me that this might be of benefit to you. Just a shot in the dark, really.