1 . In late 2021, I began to have a little bit of a midlife crisis. When my father was 48 years old, he had a heart attack that nearly ended his life. As I _________ my mid-forties, I knew that I needed to make a change in my life. I wanted to do something _________ to prove to myself and everyone else around me that I wasn’t going to have the same fate.

As I was trying to determine what kind of _________ that I wanted to set, I found a _________ called The Rut. The Rut is a series of races that are _________ in Big Sky, Montana every September. There’s multiple distances, but the 28 Kilometer _________ is the most popular, as well as the most _________ of the entire series. This race is regularly listed in the top ten most difficult races in the world. It involves almost 8,000 feet of elevation (海拔)_________ . This was the type of race I was _________ .

I also did a detailed training __________ . Even if I was traveling for business, I would stick to it and never __________ a workout (训练). And then came race day.

That day, Big Sky Montana, was unseasonably __________ , almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The race is going almost entirely above tree line, which means that you just are __________ to the elements (恶劣天气) nearly the entire time. Many people __________ out of the race halfway. But I finished it. When I reached the finish line, I was greeted by my wife and children, also friends that had traveled with us to Big Sky that day. This was the biggest challenge I had made for myself, but I __________ it.

2 . On Oct. 11, hundreds of runners competed in a cross-country race in Minnesota. Melanie Bailey should have _________ the course earlier than she did. Her _________ came because she was carrying a _________ across the finish line.

As reported by a local newspaper, Bailey was more than two-thirds of the way through her _________ when a runner in front of her began crying in pain. She _________ to help her fellow runner, Danielle Lenoue. Bailey took her arm to see if she could walk forward with _________. She couldn’t. Bailey then _________ to let Lenoue climb onto her back and carried her all the way to the finish line, then another 300 feet to where Lenoue could get _________ attention.

Once there, Lenoue was _________ and later taken to a hospital, where she learned that she had serious injuries in one of her knees. She would have struggled with extreme __________ to make it to that aid checkpoint without Bailey’s help.

As for Bailey, she is more __________ about why her act is considered a big __________. “She was just crying. I couldn’t __________ her,” Bailey told the reporter. “I feel like I was just doing the right thing.”

Although the two young women were strangers before the __________, they’ve since become friends. Neither won the race, but the __________ of human kindness won the day.

3 . Jessica Long is a famous American swimmer who has won 23 medals at the Paralympics (残奥会), becoming the second-most of any U.S. Paralympian in history. Born in 1992, Jessica was sent to an orphanage (孤儿院) and was adopted (收养) by a family from USA when she was only 13 months old.___________ , she had lost her legs below the knees ___________   a rare disease at 18 months old.

___________ , as a young girl she found her dream in swimming, and she’s never let her___________ slow her down. Being the only girl athlete on her swim team made her work ___________ harder.

“There are so many things swimming has taught me over the past 15 years,” says Jessica. “___________ you are new to the sport or not, you have to ___________ on your goals. It’s not easy getting in the pool every day, but you have to stick to your training and honor the _________ you’ve made. You don’t become great overnight, but the sweat will ___________. ”

“There were times I wanted to quit,” she adds. “I remember training with the US Olympic swim team. It was incredibly ______________ —these are some of the best athletes in the world. But I saw this challenge as an amazing chance, and it ______________   a proud moment for me.”

From an orphan at 13 months to becoming one of the greatest Paralympic swimmers of all time, Jessica has truly come a ______________ way. She has faced many ______________ that would make most of us give up. But she has faced each one head-on, and ______________ . She never stops pushing to be a better person and a better swimmer. Her determination and fighting spirit ______________ her who she is today.

4 . The first Olympic Games at Olympia were held in 776 BC. They were held _______ four years from 776 BC to 393 AD. In _______ Greece, games were _______ connected to the worship(崇拜)of the gods and heroes. They were also held as part of religious ceremonies(典礼) to _______ dead heroes. But from the beginning the games at Olympia served to _______ the Greek sense of national unity. So every four years over 1,100 years, thousands of   _______ stopped all wars and _______ to a small sanctuary(圣殿) in northwestern Greece for five days in the late summer for _______ reason-to watch the Olympic Games. During that time, _______ from all over the Greek world competed in a number of athletic __________ and worshipped the gods at Olympic. The athletes competed not for __________ or material benefits, __________ only for the honor of being Olympic visitor. Like our Olympics, __________ athletes were heroes who put their hometowns on the map. However, unlike our Olympics, only free men who spoke Greek could compete, instead of athletes from any country and the games were __________ held at Olympic instead of moving around to different places every time.

The ancient Olympics had a __________ variety（种类) of games. Many of these are the ancestors(原型) of our modern Olympic Games and had rules and playing conditions.