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Thread: Squat Form Check - Right Hip Pain

  1. #1
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    Default Squat Form Check - Right Hip Pain

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    Hi, I'm reposting this here from the form check thread per a SSC's recommendation

    Running LP for second time since 2017. I’d experienced pain then in my right hip squatting, nearing the 200# mark. I saw a SSC at that time once but we weren’t able to find anything obvious to account for the pain. I continued to squat to 230# and had to stop.

    I’m now about six weeks in at a 200# squat, 178# bw and I’m starting to feel a little of that exact same pain. It isn’t nearly as bad as it was so I’m continuing to squat.

    I have cut squatting to twice a week since feeling it, bookended on Sunday and Thursday.

    Best way I can describe the pain is, in/near the hip joint. Starting at the top of the inner hip crease and feeling it around the underside to the glute. I feel pain more near the hip crease when standing, externally rotating my femur (turning my right foot clockwise). If I cross my right foot onto my left knee, when sitting in a chair, I feel some pain but more in the glute area. Most acutely, I feel it during the squat, bouncing out of the bottom, and that is mostly felt around the hip crease.

    Here’s a back 45 and a full rear view. The rear view shows an obvious imbalance from plate to plate on the bar but curious what others might see in my legs, hips, shoulders, etc.

    I included my last sets of bench and PC. All vids stitched together.

    YouTube

    I know that my right leg is shorter, but to what degree, I don’t know. I was recently seeing a chiropractor. In my X-ray, we found a neck vertebrae near the base of the skull tweaking my head pretty badly to my right but surprisingly my hips were in decent alignment albeit with my right hip slightly higher. My right arm hangs down markedly lower from the shoulder than the left does.

  2. #2
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  3. #3
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    Ok thanks. Those are definitely helpful suggestions. I’d just recently narrowed my stance as well as playing with toe splay, just to incremental degrees.

    All the forum threads I’d read attributed to hip pain all seem to recommend widening the stance but that never alleviated the problem in 2017 (maybe my injury was too far gone at that point) and hasn’t seemed to stop it from happening again. I was just thinking that I hadn’t tried it yet and (as the book says) that with just a slightly narrower stance, my abdomen will get in the way a bit and keep me from slamming to depth. It does not seem to exacerbate any pain as those sets @ 200# did not feel too bad.

    I’ll get a piece of tape down and make sure I’m toeing it squarely.

    On the programming, is there something specific you’d recommend, or basically thinking for more a volume day- e.g. 5x5 of previous workout’s weight on Sunday and 3x5 going up 5# on Thurs?

  4. #4
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    Playing with your stance is a good thing to be doing in these types of circumstances. For many trainees, the approximation of the thigh and the belly is a contributor to the anterior hip crease pain. That is why as you are looking around suggestions to widen the stance and turn the toes our more are common. Finding small ways to increase the anatomical space in that general area can sometimes be immediately helpful. For where you are at right now I would do a volume day at 185 x 5 reps x 4 sets and an intensity day at 205 x 5 reps x 2 sets and then just bump those up 5lbs/week. Obviously this is slower than you can be progressing on an LP but it might prove to be helpful in managing your hip pain as you continue to get stronger. As you get stronger you may need to increase that offset by another 10lbs.

  5. #5
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    Ok great. I’ll do this for a few weeks and see how it’s feeling. Thank you again, Nick.

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    You're welcome!

  7. #7
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    Default Follow up

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    Hi Nick, following up here, now about a month later. I'm at 220# (183 bw) and the hip pain has been manageable. It's difficult to tell if I'm still aggravating it but I think I can say that it hasn't been getting any worse. Usually, when I do the 5 rep PR session, I can feel some dull pain after each set. But pain during the sets is seemingly not occurring and pain later that day and the following day is not too bad. Sometimes I will get a jolt if I'm crossing my legs to tie my shoes or in the middle of the night when I'm rolling over in bed, but typically daily stuff is going alright.

    Here's a video of my 3rd set, rear view. (Let me know if you still would want to see a 45 angle).

    YouTube

    I also added a clip of my first rep manually pushing the scrubber so you can see what is happening with my hips and legs in slow motion. I know you said it can be a bit of a wild goose chase but I'm still just trying little adjustments to see if anything helps. Seems to me, my hips are rotating counter clockwise through the movement on the frontal plane or the axial plane or a combination of the two. You can also see that my right leg tends to close up out of the hole, and my left seems to stay static through the whole movement. It looks like my whole body can tend to lean onto the right leg out of the hole sometimes too, which seems like the obvious culprit for any pain.

    Adjustments I made
    -widened stance
    -laid down tape at 90 degrees with 30 degree markings, so I'm toeing the line evenly and toe splay is consistent at around 30 degrees
    -I've been able to narrow my grip distance so my back is tighter and the bar held more firmly.
    -have been concentrating on not putting my lower back into overextension
    -I had been playing with sending my trunk down into the hole slightly to the left of what I usually or naturally do (or what I perceive as "natural"). I have only been trying this for most of my warm-ups. I don't know if this is helping but when I look at video, everything "looks" a little more symmetrical and the bar seems to sit on my back more evenly.


    At this point, I would certainly welcome any more suggestions here on the forum but I'm thinking I'd like to take the next step towards seeing a live coach again. I would really like to take care of this problem now (if that's even possible).

    I have a few emails that I found for you but wanted to mention the idea of contacting you directly before I did. In general, it would be great if I could get with an SSC that has some background or focus on physiology/physical therapy. I would appreciate any advice. I live in Los Angeles.

    Garrett

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