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| Age 11 |
Tim has a friend in the neighborhood named Brian. Brian plays American football and outweighs Tim by about 20lb. He has a lot more body fat than Tim does, though, and is nowhere near as quick as Tim is.
One day they were playing together at Tim's house. They were having an argument about which sport requires more strength, football or soccer.
Brian said, "I'll bet I can put a scissors on you and squeeze you harder than you can squeeze me!"
Tim (11 at the time) said, "No way! I can crush you easy"
"OK, I'll go first - you can see if you have anything left when it's your turn", said Brian.
Tim sat on the floor and Brian wrapped his legs around Tim's chest and locked his ankles together. He began to squeeze Tim. Brian was pretty strong and he was able to hold the lock for about 15 seconds. His quads began to quiver and he let go.
"Now it's my turn!" said Tim
Brian sat down and Tim put his legs around Brian's chest. He locked his ankles. "Are you ready?" he asked. "Go for it!", said Brian, grinning.
Tim's muscles are very well trained to have extremely quick response by his plyometrics. He flexed his quads as fast as he could. All of Brian's breath came out in an involuntary shout as Tim's muscles contracted hard. Tim let up for a second and then snapped his legs closed again. There was no air left in Brian's lungs this time and he could only make a little squeek. Tim kept increasing the pressure this time and his quads grew to hard ridges as he flexed them even more. As his legs straightened and his knees compressed Brian's ribs the muscles on the insides of his thighs just above the knees hardened and bulged and put even more pressure on. It looked as if Brian's chest was being crushed all the way against his spine as Tim reached maximum contraction. Tim was clenching his teeth and closing his eyes as he raised himself up off the floor and just supported himself by gripping Brian's chest with his legs.
Finally, Tim relaxed and took his legs off. Poor Brian just leaned over and gasped for air for several minutes. When he got enough breath to talk, he gasped "I guess you win...". Tim responded "Yeah, I told you so!"
