Jin training in Baguazhang

I recently came across an article with details about the various jins in bagua and how to train them (original chinese here ) that I thought would be of interest to bagua enthusiasts.

“JIN TRAINING IN BAGUAZHANG

There’s a scene in the film Pride’s Deadly Fury’ [1] in which ‘divine palm’ Li kills Niu Er on the riverbank with a single palm strike.

The power Li is using is called ‘inch power’ (cun jin).

The characteristics of inch power are that the distance between the striking body part and the target is relatively short, usually about an inch. Characteristically, inch power strikes are sudden, powerful and hence hard to detect, evade or block. The ‘collapsing palm’ (ta zhang], ‘inserting palm’ [ye zhang] and elbow strikes all train inch power. If you wish to master inch power, you must practice according to the requirements, for example, relax the shoulder and drop the elbow [song jian zhui zhou], hold the head as if suspended [xu ling ding jin], the whole body should be coordinated, with the leading hand hitting the opponent and the rear hand adding power.

Even though the movements are small, they are significant.

Apart from focusing on the movements in the bagua routines that train inch power, you can also train on trees. To train this, you need to find a youngish tree with a trunk that’s not too big. First, rest your fingertips of one hand on the tree, and then strike the trunk using the heel of your palm. When striking, the whole body should be ‘solid’ and connected, the eyes should gaze as if angry, the knee of the lead leg should push upwards, whilst the rear leg should ‘push off’ the ground. At the moment of contact between the palm and the tree, the whole body should momentarily tense up. The intent should be to break the tree in half. Then, after the strike, you should return to the relaxed ready state, again with your fingertips resting on the trunk. At first, you should use the shunbu configuration, i.e. if the right hand is striking, the right foot will be leading, with the left palm ‘chambered’ at the left kua. Then, later on, one can practice it with aobu　［i.e. opposite rather same foot stepping].

In the past, bagua practictioners would bury 1m of a 2m-long wooden board in the ground, leaving 1m sticking up. They would then nail dog pelt to the board, and use it to practice collapsing palm and inserting palm.

The palm skills of the famous Cheng-style master Li Wenbiao  [2] were developed through just this kind of training. Small trees or wooden boards were used because they had a certain elasticity. If you use a large tree or a wall, not only will you not develop inch power, you will hurt your wrist. The scene in ‘Wulin Zhi’ in which Dongfang Xu practices his palm strikes against a big old tree was just a directorial flourish to show how fearsome Dong’s palm strikes were.

‘One-inch’ strikes can very easily inflict internal damage, especially when used against the ribs. Because human ribs are quite flexible, this damage sometimes is not obvious. Hence bagua students should be very careful to control the power of their strikes when practicing against a live opponent.

THE HIDDEN POWER OF BAGUAZHANG

‘Hidden power’, as the name suggests, is a kind of force that is not externally obvious. Kicking, punching and barging are all kinds of ‘obvious power’ which can be externally observed. Hidden power can only happen when two objects are touching. The hidden power in martial arts is mostly used to for self-protection. For example, if I punch someone in the chest, my opponent will probably try to block the punch. If my punch has only got force in one plane (going forward), my punch will be deflected easily. If my punch has a resisting force that stops my opponent from changing the direction of my punch, this is called an li, aka an jin.

Liu Fengchun

Many famous masters had strong hidden power, such as the bagua master Liu Fengchun, and the xingyi master Guo Yunshen. It was as if both of these masters had ‘electricity’ in their arms, the opponent would be launched away regardless of whether they were attacking the opponent or whether the opponent was attacking them. Stationary palms [ding shi zhang] are the main method used in bagua to train hidden power. Each posture, if combined with specific visualisations and practiced correctly, can produce hidden power. For example, in the first posture, ‘pressing down palm’ [xia an zhang], both hands ‘press’ downwards as if on a ball , with the arms rounded as if holding a large balloon. Posturally, the requirements are: relax the shoulder, press the elbows out [song jian cheng zhou]; hollow the chest and round the back [han xiong ba bei], hold the head as if suspended [xu ling ding jin] and the upper body should be slightly turned towards the centre of the circle while you walk using mud-wading step [tang ni bu].

When you are walking, you should imagine that you are walking through waist-deep water and also that you are trying to keep the two balloons with you – you can’t press too lightly [letting them float away] or too hard [bursting them]. Every time you practice it you should have this visualisation. Regular practice will mean that the moment you get into the stance, you should start to get the right ‘feeling.

In Shuang Bao Zhang (Double Embracing Palm), the arms are held in front of the chest as if ‘hugging a tree’ with the plams facing inwards, the palm is hollowed and the fingers held apart, as if hugging a large balloon 50-60cm in diameter. You should imagine you are using mud-wading step to walk through shoulder-deep water. Again, you must not let the balloon float away or burst it. The next step is to imagine that waves of water are buffeting the balloon in various directions, making it bob up or sink down, or pushing it sideways, whichever way the water pushes the ball, you must keep the balloon centered and moving with you. The practice of the other 6 fixed postures is similar to the first two, readers can experiment for themselves.

By the way, the various visualisations should not be ‘held’ too strongly, otherwise you will get dizzy and will only be able to circle-walk for a short while. As you grow stronger, the visualisation should be allowed to become weaker until it is barely there. One should not pay attention to the sensations that arise during this practice, just allow them to arise and dissipate naturally.

BAGUAZHANG’S ‘SPRING POWER’ [TAN JIN]

Long-time practitioners of baguazhang develop a body where every part is springy, connected and flexible.The characteristic of springs is that, within a certain range, the more they are compressed the greater the resultant ‘spring force’. This phenomenon can be expressed by the equation F=-kX, where k is the elasticity coefficient of the material and X the degree of compression. The minus sign indicates that the relationship is inversely proportional.

As you can see from the equation, the strength of the spring force depends on the elasticity coefficient and the degree of compression. As baguazhang practitioners, we should pro-actively train to increase our ‘elasticity coefficient’.

‘Spring power’ [tan jin] is frequently used in taiji’s push hands and in bagua’s ‘drawing and leading palms’ ［xi hua zhang］ paired practice, and is also common in bagua’s free sparring [San Da]. Knowing that their opponent possesses spring power makes an attacker wary of changing his attack to other parts of the body. Spring power can be used continuously; sometimes, spring power can feel like a spring, and sometimes like a steel rod.

Apart from  ‘drawing and leading palms’ paired practice, other ways of training spring power are:

1) Resistance cords

Normally a 3m-long resistance cord is used, with the two ends fixed to something solid. The practitioner should try to move slowly with the cord resisting the arms, legs or waist. One can practice this on the spot or with moving steps. Movements should be slow; fast movements will not produce the desired effect.

2) Spring cord
Similar to the above exercise, with the cord attached to springs rather than a solid wall.

3) ‘Drawing curves’ pair work

In this exercise, two partners, A & B, stand facing each other with their right feet out in front. Their right arms should be held out in front of the chest so that the backs of the forearms touch. Then, A slowly draws a curve right and down, with B providing resistance all the way down. When A’s arm reaches its full extension, B then starts slowly drawing a curve right and up, this time with A resisting. B stops when his arm reaches full extension, and then the cycle is repeated.

4) Drawing curves with legs

A & B support each other’s arms, the right leg lightly lifts up, the feet touch and draw a curve. The method is similar to that described above for arms.

The methods described above use the right arm/leg, but could equally use the left side, readers can practice by themselves.

BAGUAZHANG’S HORIZONTAL POWER [HENG JIN]

Bagua’s horizontal power is indispensable in actual combat. It’s always been the case that vertical power is easy to train, horizontal less so. Horizontal power is especially important in a match between a smaller, weaker opponent and a stronger, larger opponent, where the smaller guy will have to rely on skill to win. Most of the time, people stand in ‘ding ba bu’, with the front foot pointing straight forward and the rear foot pointing diagonally outwards. In pushing hands or free sparring you should search for your opponent’s horizontal axis whilst protecting your own. Conditions in a fight change by the moment, no-one can guarantee that they can always protect their horizontal axis. As soon as you feel your opponent beginning to control your horizontal axis, you should resist it in order to gain yourself some time to reverse the situation.

Gao-style baguazhang master Liu Fengcai's Single Palm Change. Source: Pa Kua Chang Journal

On the other hand, you need strong horizontal power if you are to use it to attack your opponent. Bagua’s routines give prominent expression to horizontal power. For example, in Single Palm Change, the lead palm twists and pulls outwards, while the rear palm follows; in ‘plant a flower by a tree [yi hua jie mu], the drawing back and outward pressing of the forearm; in ‘black bear turns its back’, the back leans backwards and the palms press downwards. If these moves are done like callisthenics, one will not derive much benefit. It is only when one understands the point of these moves and couples them with intent that they can produce horizontal power.”

Footnotes

1. ‘Pride’s Deadly Fury’ (1983), known in Chinese as ‘Wulin Zhi’, is one of the few Chinese kungfu films to feature baguazhang training methods and techniques. The main female role of Gao Lianzhi is played by none other than Ge Chunyan, a student of Sun Zhijun and Liu Jingru. You can see a clip from the movie here .

2. Li Wenbiao was a famous student of Cheng Tinghua and grand-teacher (through Luo Xingwu) of Liu Jingru.

Pei Xirong

The following translation is an excerpt taken from this article .

“Pei Xirong was born in 1913 in Raoyang county in Hebei province. His father was a core member of the Yi He Tuan [1], and his mother had also participated in the ‘Red Lantern’ movement [2]. His uncle, Qi Dalong, was a bodyguard in the caravan agency established by Li Cunyi who guarded caravans travelling between Tianjin and Gubeikou. When the Allied Forces invaded Tianjin, he and Li Cunyi battled against the invaders at Laolongtou Train Station. He fought courageously, sustaining several wounds.

Pei Xirong

The feats of his forefathers inspired Pei Xirong, so that from a young age he held aspirations of practicing martial arts to serve his country. Pei Xirong’s family had practiced Traditional Chinese Medicine for 4 generations; it was for this reason that Pei’s grandfather, an able doctor, was called ‘Pei San Tie’ (3 poultice Pei). Pei carried on the family tradition, learning TCM at the same time as martial arts, laying down a solid foundation in the process. In 1929, 16-year old Pei went to the ‘National Leitai Tournament’ held in Hangzhou. Whilst there, he met the famous master of xingyi and bagua, Fu Jianqiu, and had the good fortune to become his student.

Fu Jianqiu was a skilled disciple of Li Cunyi. In the winter of 1929, Fu Jianqiu, accompanied by Pei, went to Wudang Shan in Hubei province at the behest of Li Jinglin. At the Purple Cloud Palace (Zi Xiao Gong) on Wudang, he met the Taoist abbot Xu Benshan. Pei Xirong recounted that Fu Jianqiu had compared skills with Xu Benshan 3 times, with each expressing admiration for the other’s skills In the end, Fu considered that Xu was an accomplished martial artist  who had left behind the ‘world of dust’ [the secular world] and so became his student. He was accepted as a 16^th-generation disciple of Wudang martial arts, and was given the Taoist name ‘Fu Taishan’ (the ‘He’ character generation) whilst Pei was inscribed as a 17^th-generation inheritor of the ‘Jiao’ character generation. [3]

A young Fu Jianqiu practicing Beng Quan (Crushing Fist)

Fu and Pei lingered in the Zi Xiao Gong for several months, learning Wudang Taiji Neigong, Qian Kun Qiu (Male & Female Ball), Xuanwu staff, Taiyi Sanshou and Wudang sword amongst other things.

The years of arduous training spent following Fu were the start of Pei Xirong’s martial arts career. Later on, Li Jinglin recommended that Pei continue his studies at the Nanjing Central Martial Arts Academy. After that, Pei did stints as a TCM doctor in Beijing and Zhengzhou. Whilst in Zhengzhou, he also worked as an editor for the Sports section of the ‘North China Daily’ (Huabei Ri Bao). Throughout all this, he continued to practice his martial arts, and also learnt Xinyi Liuhe quan from the famous master Bao Ding (aka Bao Xianting).

Pei Xirong’s skills improved in leaps and bounds under the tutelage of his various teachers. Bao Xianting thought particularly highly of Pei, entrusting him with teaching duties as well as compiling martial arts manuals.

In the mid-1930s, the North China Daily was forced to cease publication because it had published several progressive poems. As a result, Pei left Zhengzhou and returned to the Central Martial Arts Academy in Nanjing. One day, as he was walking along the bank of the Qinhuai river, he saw some hoodlums harassing a young lady.  Furious, Pei used the ‘Single Seizing’ (Dan Ba) of Xin Yi Quan to throw one of the hoodlums into the river. The others, upon seeing this, quickly fled.

By sheer coincidence, the then head of the Central Martial Arts Academy, Prof. Huang Bonian, happened to witness this scene. Seeing that Pei was both of upright character and was unusually skilled, Huang accepted Pei as his disciple on the spot, going on to teach Pei his ‘Dragon Shape Baguazhang’. Later Pei Xirong also learnt Bagua Taiji and Bagua Yinyang Panshou from Wu Junshan. By this point Pei Xirong’s first teacher, Fu Jianqiu was teaching in Wuxi in Jiangsu province. In the subsequent years, Pei continually shuttled between Nanjing and Wuxi. In this time, he became more powerful and learnt the essence of the internal arts of Xingyiquan, Baguazhang, Taijiquan and Wudangquan.

After the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese war, the Central Martial Arts Academy moved to the Soutwestern city of Chongqing (formerly Chungking), and later worked as a doctor in Xi’an. Pei Xirong spent several years living near the Little Goose Pagoda. On numerous occasions, he attended to soldiers fighting the Japanese as well as local people for free, earning him a good reputation in the area.  After the Japanese surrender, Pei returned to the East of china via Xuzhou. His train was halted at Bengbu (in Anhui province) by an accident, and hence Pei decided to lodge at the Bengbu Transport Hotel. One morning, he was spotted by a local Praying Mantis master named Li as he was practicing his martial arts in a park. Li paid Pei a visit at his hotel and invited him to a banquet being held at another hotel. After the banquet was over, Li asked if he and Pei could compare skills. Pei Xirong suggested that each of them perform one routine, to see each other’s techniques. Li replied ‘If you’re worried about our techniques, I’ll spar with my disciple’ .  So saying, Li started to spar with his disciple. His palm techniques were impressive, and was accustomed to using slaps to the face to win.

Pei hitched up his robe and started sparring with Li. Li kept on trying to attack Pei’s face, only for Pei to evade each time. Li was skilled, and was suddenly attacked Pei’s waist with the technique ‘Gui Chuai Jiao’ (‘devil kick’). Li’s intent in doing so was that if the technique landed, Pei would be injured for sure; if he used his arms to try and ‘catch’ the leg, Li would attack Pei’s face. In order to defend against Li’s attack to the face, Pei used his leg to intercept the kick. Li then grabbed Pei’s intercepting leg. Pei then employed the ‘shaking jin’ (tandou jin) in the ‘Chong Xi’ (‘knee butt’) technique from Xingyi’s ‘8 character set’ (Ba Zi Gong) to strike Li’s ribs, knocking Li to the floor.

Li then got up and tried to use ‘Wicked tiger pounces on sheep’ (E Hu Pu Yang) to headbutt Pei in the chest. Pei, seeing that Li was going all out, used a dislocation technique to dislocate Li’s lower jaw. Afterwards, Pei relocated Li’s jaw and gave him some medicine. The two became friends after that, with Li asking Pei to stay in Bengbu to exchange techniques.

Pei’s victory over Li raised Pei’s profile in Anhui province a lot. Soon, two well-known boxers from Zhengyangguan came to Bengbu to invite Pei to come to Zhengyangguan to see the sights and meet the boxers there. One of the Gaos was so strong he could play with a 100 kg stone lock [4] as if flicking a marble. Pei, upon realising his strength, used his ‘dragon shape baguazhang’ to weave and evade, so that Gao could not get in close. So although Gao was strong, he could find no opportunity to grab Pei. Because Gao had practiced so much ‘hard gongfu’ (ying gong), as the bout became more prolonged, he started to tire and wheeze. Gao, wanting to get Pei to stand still, picked up a handful of sand from the ground and flung it at Pei’s eyes.  To his surprise, Pei was ready for this and pulled out his iron fan, blocking the sand. Gao then grabbed Pei’s arm and attempted to use the ‘Back Pack’ technique from Shuai Jiao, to which Pei Xirong once again used a dislocation technique to dislocate Gao’s forearm, winning the bout.

Immediately after his victory at Zheng Yang Guan, Pei took a train from Bengbu to Wuxi, where one of his friends introduced him to work in the Athletics Department of Jiangnan University. In 1951, Jiangnan University obeyed orders to merge with Nanjing University, and so Pei came to Shanghai to teach at Fudan university (one of the best universities in China). During his time in Shanghai, he continued to train hard, gaining pointers from Yin Yuzhang (Yin Fu’s son), Dong Wenxiu [5], Huang Boshou and Hu Yaozhen [6]. With the advent of the Cultural Revolution, Pei’s teaching duties were put on hold.”

Gao Tie Niao, one of Pei's students, practicing baguazhang

After Pei retired, he accepted appointments to various Qigong and martial art associations and went on lecture tours in Japan, Malaysia and Singapore.  His students include Gao Tieniao (now teaching in Sweden), as well as Liu Xiaoling and Jane Yao (both now teaching in the USA).

[1] The Yihetuan, lit. ‘Righteous Harmony Society’, more commonly known as the Boxers, was a sect that believed that they could perform extraordinary feats through training, martial arts and prayer. They launched the Boxer Rebellion (1898-1901).

[2] The ‘Red Lantern’ group was a branch of the Yihetuan that accepted only women, local to Tianjin.

[3] In a traditional Chinese martial arts ‘family’, disiples are often given generation names based on a poem passed down by the founder of the style. Thus, for example, the fourth generation baguazhang master Sun Zhijun is from the ‘shan ‘[mountain] character generation, based on a poem left by Dong Haichuan.

［4］Stone padlocks were used for weight training in traditional chinese martial arts.

[5] Dong Wenxiu was a master of bagua and xingyi who was thought to be a grand-newphew of Dong Haichuan. Most of his teaching came from Liang Zhenpu, but he also received instruction from Liu Fengchun, Li Cunyi and Zhang Zhaodong.

[6] Hu Yaozhen (1897-1973) was a master of Xinyiquan who was also well versed in acupuncture, chinese medicine and various kinds of qigong. He first learned Xinyiquan from Peng Tingjuan, and Mu Xiuyi and later learnt taijiquan from Zhang Qinglin (Yang Chengfu’s nephew) . He is most famous for having taught Feng Zhiqiang.