1 . Chris Turnbull, 39, finished the touching 3,856 km run on September 16, in the Sydney suburb of Manly, becoming the quickest runner from Perth to Sydney. He _________ the current record holder Achim Heukemes, who completed the distance in 43 days in 2005. To _________ the new world record, he was wholeheartedly _________ to preparing himself.

Mr Turnbull had a(n) _________ for running at a young age. He ran his first half marathon at 9 and since then he had been _________ at plenty of ultra marathons at different times in his life.

Mr Turnbull had run every single day from his beachside home in the Sydney suburb of Clontarf to his _________ on work days. The daily cross country run _________ him to see the sights of Australia, meet amazing people and most importantly, _________ himself physically and mentally.

With his 40th birthday _________ next year, to see what was his physical and mental limit, he wanted to __________ himself to the new record.

To make it in record time, Mr Turnbull was running between 100 km and 105 km daily.He had to __________ huge trucks rushing past him on major highways, blisters(水泡), aching muscles, and being __________ of sleeping well due to the pain his body was feeling

Mr Turnbull’s wife, along with their two kids, had been tracking his __________   on a map from their home as he made his way across the continent. They were __________ waiting there at the finish line in Manly for Mr Turnbull’s falling into their arms for a loving post- run __________.

2 . I had been skiing since childhood. I’d _________ fallen, I’d never crashed into anything, and I’d _________ mostly to the “blue” trails — the ones for intermediate (中级水平的) skiers. Therefore, for my first day on the mountain, I decided to _________ a blue run, one I had done many times before.

When I reached the top of the blue trails — only chairlift (缆椅), though, something in the atmosphere _________. Why was it so cold? Were the blue trails always this sharp? The rhythm of the chairlift started to sound less _________.

It _________ that simply having skied “many times before” didn’t mean I was getting better at it. There’s a large body of _________ showing that practice—or even just doing — doesn’t make us any better at the activity, so it is with skiing. The joy of getting better sometimes comes along with the _________ of getting worse.

One afternoon, I took a chairlift with a retired ski _________ named Bob. When I told him I was struggling, he __________ to watch me take an easy slope and assessed what I was doing wrong.

Bob __________ me that the learning process looks a lot like backsliding (倒退). When babies first learn to walk, they progress from __________ imitation. Sometimes it seems that we’re losing ground, but we’re actually __________ a new skill. An __________ attempt is often a sign that you’re learning.

“You’re skiing better already!” he shouted at me.

“Thank you!” I yelled back.

Then I skied a few more feet and __________.

3 . My teammates cheered.

Long before Camcorders (便携式摄像机) tapes, our coach would have every game _______, have it developed overnight and ready for Monday`s _______. Dressed only in football pants and our smelling T-shirts, we listened to Coach’s _______ of the previous game, his voice was barely heard over the noise of the projector.

He rarely _______ out good plays, but was quick to find _______. One afternoon, he _______ me. The quarterback was my least favorite play — I was supposed to pull from my right tackle position and trap the linebacker on the left side of the line. Coach knew I was too _______ for that play. Why did he _______ a play he knew I couldn’t do?

In the film room, Coach _______ the play up five or six times, “Wilson, you’ve got to get the lead (铅) out of your pants. If you`re going to remain as our strong-side tackle position, you’re going to have to __________ these moves.” He really let me __________ it! Finally, he __________ pressing the reverse button (回放键) and let the play finish.

During the game, though it looked like I wouldn’t make the block, I __________ down, dashed __________ the defender and took him out of the game. Our striker ran through the hole and make a __________ goal.

I wasn’t a good football player. The truth is, I was __________ to be on the team. I had size and __________, but was too slow to be effective. Coach was __________ in assuming I wouldn’t make that block, __________ I didn’t. But this time I did. Not because of ability, but because of __________ and determination. As Coach used to say, “Wilson, you’ve got to give it 110% if you’re going to be a starter on my team.”

He was right then, and is right now. Thanks, Coach.

5 . A recent series of studies examined the role of talent in the sports world. They focused on three different sports: World Cup soccer, professional basketball, and professional baseball. The results are mixed. For soccer and basketball, the studies revealed that adding talented players to a team is indeed a (n) _______ strategy, but only up to a point. Performance _______ when about 70% of the players were considered top talent. Above that level, the team’s performance began to decline. Interestingly, this trend was not evident in baseball, where additional _______ talent continued to enhance the team’s performance. (Figure 1 and 2)

In looking for an explanation for the different results for different sports, the researchers _______one important factor — the extent to which a good performance by a team required its members to coordinate (协调) their actions. This task _______ distinguishes baseball from basketball and soccer.

In baseball, the performance of individual players is _______ teammates than in soccer and basketball. The researchers concluded that when, during the course of play, task interdependence is high, team performance will _______ when there is too much talent in the group. When task interdependence is lower, _______ individual talent will have a positive effect on team performance.

One explanation for this phenomenon is not so far from the pecking order (等级排序) situation among chickens. If a basketball star is pursuing his own personal goals,_______ trying to gather a high personal point total, he may be less ________ than team player. He may take a shot himself when it would be better to pass the ball to a team mate, thus making the team’s overall performance suffer. “There is no________in TEAM,” young children learning to play team sports are often told. Apparently stars ________ follow this basic principle of sportsman ship.

Another possibility is that when there is a lot of talent on a team, some players may begin to________ This is referred to as the Ringelmann effect. Ringelmann conducted an experiment in which he asked two, three, four, and up to 28 people to participate in a game of tug-of-war. He measured how much force each person used to pull the rope. He found that whenever he added a person to the team, everyone else pulled with less force.

________ the ideal team — for sports, business, science, or entertainment — is more complicated than simply hiring the best talent. An A-team may require a________ not just A players, but a few generous B players as well.

8 . When I started the Fit Nation programme, I was a big guy. Seven months later, I'm still a big guy. I've run endless miles, biked endless hills and swum endless laps. Is there _______ of me? Yes. Am I fitter? Yes. Am I healthier? _______ . But am I finished? NO WAY！

There has been quite a debate ranging in recent years about _______ you can be "fat and fit” . There's no easy answer to that question. Perhaps the answer varies from person to person as our goals _______ .

Over the years, everyone in the Fit Nation family has achieved great success, but in many cases, the pounds don't always dramatically _______ . We've all gained strength and improved our cardiovascular(心血管的)health, but I never _______ this as a weight-loss programme. At least for me, the real changes have been in my body（more muscles and less fat）, my overall endurance and my mental _______ .

I've learned that being healthy is ultimately about being honest with myself. It's about being honest about what I can accomplish and what I can _______ to accomplish in the short term and in the long term. While I'm _______ now than I was at the beginning of the year, I still have improvements to make and fitness to ________ . I hope to continue making gains for the rest of my life.

Setting goals is really pretty simple when you think about it. A ________ is something for which you're willing to work. And you get what you want by planning and putting that plan into ________ . I have more goals to set and more success to ________ .

The only true measure of my accomplishment is how far I've come and how much farther I have to go. Most ________ , I've come to understand that fitness is a journey and not a ________ .

9 . Fitness experts weigh in on whether it’s safe to skip this sometimes annoying step in your exercise routine.

One of the most important steps in your fitness routine comes at the conclusion. Many know the importance of properly warming up and preparing to exercise, but experts say that incorporating a cool down routine is just as important. According to the Mayo Clinic, cooling down allows for your body to recover and return to its normal, _________ state.

Though cooling down isn’t proven to _________ muscle stiffness or soreness, it can prevent dizziness and allow your heart rate and breathing to ease back to a normal rate, Harvard Medical School reports. Phyllis Mammarelli, personal trainer at the Shenango Valley YMCA in Sharon, Pennsylvania, works with each of her clients on a cool down routine as she says it’s a (n) _________ part of exercising.

“Cooling down allows your body to gradually return to a low-intensity activity level, slowly reducing your respiratory and heart rate until it’s equalized and back to normal” she says.

_________ the recovery phase of a workout isn’t proven to be harmful to your body, but Mammarelli warns that without cooling down, the body will take longer to return back to the low-intensity level activity level you began your workout with.

There are also non-threatening side effects that could occur as a result of forgoing a cool down. Mammarelli warns that blood can gather or pool in your lower extremities and lead to dizziness and _________. Additionally, ACE says to keep an eye on your _________ soreness and stiffness. While soreness after a workout is to be expected, _________ onset muscle soreness can occur 24 - 28 hours after your workout and cause “uncomfortable debilitating pain”. Side effects are mostly seen in the elderly or those with cardiovascular disease and can be _________ by warming up and cooling down. Here are some other signs that you might be working out too much.

Allow five to 10 minutes at the _________ of your workout for a cool-down routine. During this period, continue your workout session, but at a much reduced rate. If you’re __________ for time during your workouts or unsure how to allow your body to recover, Mammarelli suggests stretching muscles in a pain-free range of __________. Here’s an easy stretch __________ to try.

Tacking on a few __________ minutes to your workout for cooling down may seem like a(n) __________, but the benefits outweigh the cost of finding extra time in your __________. If you need inspiration for scheduling the time to workout and cool downlook to these women who work out every day.

10 . How Exercise may tame our anxiety

To better cope with all the dispiriting news this winter about rising Covid-19 _________, you might want to get out and play in the snow, according to a new report. The large-scale study of almost 200,000 cross-country skiers found that being physically active _________ the risk of developing anxiety over time.

Science already offers plenty of encouraging evidence that exercise can lift our _________. Experiments show that when people (and lab animals) start _________ they typically grow calmer, happier and less apt to feel sad, nervous or angry than before. Studies that focus on the links between one type of activity or behavior and various aspects of health or longevity, likewise find that more exercise is linked with substantially lower chances of developing severe depression; conversely, being _________ increases the risk for depression. A remarkable neurological study from 2013 even found that exercise _________ reductions in rodent anxiety, by prompting an increase in the production of specialized neurons that release a chemical that soothes over-activity in other parts of the brain.

_________, most of these studies were small, short term or mainly relevant to mice, leaving _________ many questions about what kinds of exercise might help our mental health, how long mood enhancements might potentially last, whether men and women _________ equally and whether it is possible to work out too much and perhaps increase your likelihood of feeling emotionally worse off.

So, for the new study, which was published in Frontiers in Psychiatry, exercise scientists at Lund University in Sweden and other __________ decided it would be worthwhile to __________ the long-term mental health of the thousands upon thousands of men and women who have raced Sweden’s famous Vasaloppet cross-country skiing event over the years.

The Vasaloppet, which celebrates its 100th anniversary this winter, is the largest series of cross-country ski __________ in the world, with crowds of racers annually lining up in the woods of central Sweden to fastly move and glide through races __________ in length from 30 kilometers, or almost 19 miles, to 90K, about 56 miles. Because this kind of endurance event requires abundant health, stamina and training, researchers previously have used data about Vasaloppet racers to study how exercise influences cancer risks, heart __________, and longevity.

The skiers, the researchers found, proved to be __________ calmer over the decades after their race than the other Swedes, with more than 50 percent less risk of developing clinical anxiety. Their results indicate the link between exercise and reduced anxiety is strong.