【推荐2】Women have jumped ahead of men for the first time in using the Internet to do their holiday shopping,according to a study published last week in the US.

For years men have been more likely to shop on the Internet than women,but during the 2011 holiday season 58 percent of those making online purchases（购买）were women.

“It shows how mainstream the Internet is becoming”,said Lee Rainie,director of the Pew Internet and American Life Project group,which carried out the study.

Rainie said it was only a matter of time before women shoppers caught up with men.This is because women traditionally make decisions about spending.

Users were more likely to shop online to save time.Internet users between the ages of 18 and 29 were responsible for some of the most dramatic increases in the online gift-buying population this time around.

However,three-quarters of the US Internet users did not buy holiday gifts online in 2011.They worried about credit card security（安全）,or just compared online prices with off-line prices,then dashed off to t he shops to get the best deals.

“But even if shoppers don’t buy online,websites are becoming promotion tools for stores,”said Dan Hess,vice president of Comscore Networks Inc.Hess said that actually most stores’ websites can make customers fully believe the security of their credit card numbers.And most are able to ensure that gifts arrive on time.“It’s all about making the shopping experience more efficient,more reliable and more comfortable.”Hess said.

【推荐1】SYDNEY : As they sat sharing sweets beside a swimming pool in 1999,Shane Gould and Jessicah Schipper were simply getting along well, chatting about sport, life and “anything else that came up”. Yet in Sydney next month, they will meet again by the pool, and for a short time the friends will race against each other in the 50-meter butterfly (蝶泳)in the Australian championships at Homebush Bay.

Gould, now a 47-year-old mother of four, has announced she will be making a return to elite competition(顶级赛事)to swim the one event, having set a qualifying (合格的) time of 30.32 seconds in winning gold at last year’s United States Masters championships. Her comeback comes 32 years after she won three golds at the Munich Olympics.

Schipper, now a 17-year-old from Brisbane with a bright future of going to Athens for her first Olympics, yesterday recalled (回忆) her time with Gould five years ago.

" I was at a national youth camp on the Gold Coast and Shane had come along to talk to us and watch us train,’’ Schipper explained.” It seemed as if we had long been good friends. I don't know why. We just started talking and it went from there."

"She had a lot to share with all of us at that camp. She told us stories about what it was like at big meets like the Olympics and what it’s like to be on an Australian team. It was really interesting. ”

Next time, things will be more serious. “ I will still be swimming in the 50m butterfly at the nationals, so there is a chance that I could actually be competing against Shane Gould,” said Schipper, who burst onto the scene at last year’s national championships with second places in the 100m and 200m butterfly.

【推荐2】U.S. Open Championships

The US Open has been in existence for more than 120 years. The first tournament was held in 1881 at the Newport Casino. It was called the US National Singles Championship. Entry was limited to only those clubs which were members of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association, and the competitors were all male, competing in both singles and doubles. Richard Sears won the men’s championship and he went on to win the next six men’s singles championships.

The Wimbledon

In 1875, the All England Croquet Club was troubled financially due to declining membership. A new sport called lawn tennis was gaining fast in popularity and taking away the members. Two years later, a new roller was needed for maintaining its lawns so the club proposed to hold a tournament to raise money. Twenty-two players entered that first Wimbledon tournament which was won by Spencer Gore in straight sets over W. C. Marshall. Two hundred spectators each paid a shilling to watch the final game, enabling the club to buy the needed roller plus some extra cash.

The French Open

The very first French Championship was held way back in 1891, and the tournament has since grown into one of the four tennis Grand Slam tournaments we know today. The first competition was a one-day national championship which was won by a British. The competition was poorly attended by world class players. It took 24 years before it became fully international and an accepted tennis grand slam event. After the First World War, French tennis was achieving stature. Suzanne Lenglen was the predominant French player, winning the championships six times between 1920 and 1926.

The Australian Open

The very first tennis tournament ever played in Australia was held in January 1880, on the courts of the Melbourne Cricket Club. In 1905, the Australian Open was established as the Australasian Tennis Championship and was played at the Warehouseman's Cricket Ground in Melbourne. It became the Australian Championship in 1927 and the Australian Open in 1969. Women’s events were added in 1922.

【推荐3】The U.K. has lots of strange traditions.    1    This racing is on Pancake Day which falls on the last Tuesday of February. On this day, people across the U.K. make and eat pancakes.

    2    As they run, they have to throw the pancake in the air so that it flips and lands back in the pan. The winner is the first to reach the finish line.

One of the most famous pancake races is the Rehab Parliamentary Pancake Race. This takes place on the morning of Pancake Day in London, outside the Houses of Parliament.     3    One team is made up of members of parliament, and the other is made up of journalists. The race is shown on the news and is reported on TV.    4    It raises money for the charity Rehab, which works with people with disabilities in the UK.

Another important aspect of the race is the official starter. The starter is seen as a respectable role and is usually given to a British news host.    5