Body Defense

Try to imagine I young man around the age of 19, he has just finished his first year of college and has put on some weight. He has never weighed this much in his whole life in fact he had never been over 200 pounds before. Well this man was me at the end of my freshman year. After finishing football in the fall I started to let my weight slip away from me by not paying any attention to what I was eating or drinking. Before I knew it I was up to 215 pounds and had lost what speed and strength I had left but I didn’t realize this until the first week of summer break when my sister commented and said that she had never seen me this big and asked if something was wrong. I was shocked, I had always been slim and toned until know. I went from 180 to 215 in one year of college. At this point I knew that I had to change what I was doing fast or the upcoming football season was going to be very tough and I could possible loss my spot. So I called up my trainer Mike Herman from Train Hard Train Smart and told him my situation. Without hesitation he said he could help me and to come in to do a workout session with him so he could judge what needed to be done. Needless to say what he saw was not very good, so he put me on this intense diet, which I was skeptical about at first but by the end I couldn’t have been happier with my results. Alongside this diet I weight trained and ran three times a week sometimes more. I came into that next football season back down to 185 pounds and had regained my speed and strength. Train Hard Train Smart helped to turn my whole situation around for the better and set me back on track the right way. I can’t thank Mike Herman enough for his help to get me back to normal.

When it comes to lifting weights there are certain muscles that most people like to focus on the most. Those muscles would be biceps, triceps, quads, gluts and calves. The reason why people like to focus on this so much is because those are the ones that are usually visible or looked at most often. So with that said most would want all of them tight and fit to show them off. This is when my simple workout comes in handy. I am going to post two workouts, the first being one that you can do in the gym with weights and the other being one that you can do at home that involves mainly body weight.  I am also going to add in Super Sets which are two or three techniques that are done one after another without a break in between. I will mark those with an SS.

In Gym:

               1SS Bicep Curls    4x10

               2 Tricep Pull Downs   4x20

               3 Reverse Curls   4x10

Take a minute break between each super set once you finish all three techniques

               Front Squat    6x10, 8, 6, 4, 2, 2

               1SS Barbell Lunges    4x10

2 Box Jumps    4x5

Barbell Calf Raises    4x40

Take a minute break between each set when doing Front Squats and after each set

 In House:

               1SS Diamond Push Ups   4x20

               2 Forearm Push Ups    4x10

               1SS Body Weight Squats   5x20

               2 Body weight Lunges    5x20

               3 Jumping Knee Tucks   5x10

               4 Calve Raises   5x20 

When it comes to lifting weights I categories it into three different groups. The first being beginner, then intermediate and finally expert. Each stage has its own set of lifting techniques and weight levels that should be followed for maximum gains and safety. 

Beginner 

What the beginner level means is you have never lifted before or have only been lifting for a short amount of time. So you are just starting to learn the techniques for the main lifts and are either still on body weight or very low weight. If you are in this level the most important part is not to focus on putting a bunch of weight on the the bar and trying to lift it. This stage is for getting the right form down so you wont hurt yourself or others. Also this stage is good for people who are mainly focused on toning and not muscle gain. People in this stage should use body weight at first then slowly move into weight being careful not to start with to much. For example lets say its your 2 week of lifting and you have started to get stronger so you move to the weights. Don’t go over and grab the 45 pound dumbbells and try to do chest press. Start with 20 or 25 pounds and go from there. That goes for core lifts and machines as well.

Intermediate   

This stage comes in when you have been lifting for several months and have grasped the main technique for the lifts and have moved over the 100 pound mark for the core lifts such as bench,squat,clean and dead lift but are under the 400 pound range. Now someone can be in the intermediate level but lift under 100 if they have been lifting for longer then a year or so because they understand the form and aren't lifting for muscle gain but lifting for strength and toning. This stage is where most people who lift weights stay because they aren’t trying to build muscle like a body builder. They just want to be in good shape with good muscle gains. For example the picture above shows myself benching 225. I am in this level even though i have been lifting for over 10 years because i am building strength and muscle for football. Also my form is still not perfect but very close to it. The people who have perfect form and are trying to lift a car are the experts. 

Expert

Social media and surveillance is becoming a big topic in today's society because it is on a rise in popularity. One of the front runners in this area is Marwick who defines surveillance as individuals either watching or looking at one another s page or social media site.  He then goes to categorize this idea into three ways such as power, hierarchy and reciprocity. 

Power is exactly what it sounds like, its the power large companies such as the ones who run the main stream sites and also homeland security who  monitor our activities on a daily basis. Either through different links that we may choice or through security cameras and more that are around us. 

Hierarchy is put simply that when it comes to social media there really is no hierarchy. That when it comes down to it everyone is an individual on social media, there is no boss and subordinate or mother, daughter, only individuals. 

Last is reciprocity which is really thinking about a post before you post it but also thinking about how others that may see your post will interrupt it. So pretty much taking both sides of the post into consideration.   

There was also a case study done that talked about girls Facebook stalking other girls and ones ex boyfriend. The reasoning they gave to justify there stalking was so they could keep up with the older girls and also to just check and see what her ex and his new girlfriend where up to.  

After reading about this i came across an article that confused me a bit because it clashed with the idea of power.  NYPD Increases Social Media Surveillance To Stop ‘Lone Wolf’ Terrorists is the name of the article by thinkprogress.org. It talks about how the NYPD have been taking social media talk little and how it has turned into cases where police men and women are getting attacked from people who have been supposedly giving empty threats online. So what they are going to start doing is monitoring social media more thoroughly so that they can help to prevent any more of these events from happening.