1 . My name is Annijke Wade, and I am an adaptive athlete. ________, an adaptive mountain biker.

It was July 17, 2021. I was mountain biking at my favorite downhill mountain on my favorite trail. I hit a barrier and tried to ________ as much speed as I could. Unfortunately; I ________ hitting the next barrier.

I could no longer feel or move anything ________ my chest. I knew at some point I was paralyzed (瘫痪的). I stayed at the hospital for 17 days, ________ to move 75 percent of my body.

For the last few years I have enjoyed every aspect of mountain biking. I love being able to take in nature in that particular ________ So after the accident, I knew I wanted to be back on the trail and I felt the need to build my ________ around adaptive mountain biking. So three to five days after my accident, I started to ________ all of my time and energy into researching this sport.

The experience of learning how to mountain bike again has been fun and ________, and the natural, safe progression of skills has been really important. I have to remember that although visiting the same trails, I have a ________ body. Taking that step back has allowed me to feel confident in those moments of extreme uncertainty as I ________ the trails.

Each day there are going to be tons of issues. For instance, putting pants on used to be something that took less than 30 seconds, and now it can take ten minutes. Whenever I ________ in tasks that take longer than before, I just try to be present and not think about how ________ the task may be.

Every single day you have the opportunity to decide whether to accept your situation or not. Some days it’s easy. Some days it’s a(n)________. But I do think it’s a matter of choice. Coming to terms with my accident has been really ________ in allowing me to reenter mountain bike as an adaptive athlete.

2 . The Martin County High School boys’ basketball team was in the final quarter of a nail-biter of a game at a regional tournament in Pikeville, Ky., when live music ______ started playing for them.

They knew it wasn’t their school’s ______ 23-member band —which was unable to ______ the game because of a bus driver shortage. The music was coming from the nearly 100-member band of a rival (对手的) school, Pike County Central High School. The score was ______ in the tough game when the music filled the air.

Jason Johnson, Pike Central Band director, said some audience members and cheerleaders started encouraging his band to ______ the playing field and perform for Martin County Cardinals. “I was ______, well, what should I do?” Johnson recalled. The score was 64-64.

The band members, though, seemed ______ to replace Martin County’s band. “It was the students who really stepped up and ______, “said Johnson, who ultimately ______ his concerns and decided, “Let’s just do it.”

As they started their first song, the Cardinals’ ______ skyrocketed (飞涨，猛涨). “We just wanted to ______ them in a time when they needed encouragement most.” said one band member.

______ the Cardinals secured a ______ in overtime. Players said the ______ from the band helped them come out on top. Now, the team is ______ for the state tournament, marking the school’s first time competing at that level in 40 years.

3 . I had been swimming for years but was ready to quit. My _________ reason was that I kept receiving “Honorable Mentions”, just because I showed up.

One day before a big swim meet, I decided to _________ the news to my grandma that I was _________ the swim team. When I told her, she said, “Baby, remember: Quitters never win and winners never quit.” I was _______   to say anything but “Yes, ma’am.”

The next day we arrived at the swim meet late, _________ my group. My coach _________ I swim with the older group. I knew she was _________ me in the race so our journey to the meet would not be wasted, and she had no expectations that I would _________ anything but eighth place as there weren’t nine _________.

As I was __________ the board, my grandmas words rang in my head. I shut my eyes and took a deep breath.

SPLASH! I swam harder than ever. After a little while, I was __________ to find that I had a half-body length ________ over others. However, they soon __________ the gap. Halfway through the race, the girl to my left almost ________ me. Right then, the powerful words __________ again in my ears. I __________ my arms and legs and used every last bit of __________ to swim the last 50 meters.

I made it! Narrow victory as it was, I did win my first real __________ that day. Everything felt like a dream as I stood on the winner’s __________. Back at home, I __________ replaced all the “Honorable Mentions” on my shelf.

4 . Football is one of those sports that develop a strong bond between teammates. It requires every member to _________ the player next to him/her. At Eastern Michigan University’s team, Zack Conti was the hardest-working player, but he didn’t receive a scholarship.

Conti’s teammate Brian Dooley discovered that Conti was doing everything he could to _________ team practices, studies and had to pay his way through school for four years. Then Dooley turned to Chris Creighton, head football coach, who explained that the _________ was 85 scholarships a period and it was hard and _________. The next day, Dooley went into Chris Creighton’s office, saying, “Coach, I’ve talked it over with my family and I’m _________ to give up my scholarship as a gift to Zack Conti. He really _________ it.”

At a team meeting, Creighton made the _________ and handed Conti the scholarship. The team burst into wild cheers, and Conti was soon _________ beneath his teammates who were jumping up and down in _________.

When asked about the decision, Dooley shared, “I did it because I’ve seen Conti __________ over the years. Seeing him walk away from something that he loves did not sit __________ with me. Giving up my scholarship so he can stay and play __________ everything. Competition can __________ us to be better people. Through competition, we can learn that a team isn’t really about competing at all, but cooperating to reach a united goal.”

For most student athletes in all sports, the __________ they get from their teammates is what helps them get through the challenge of __________ the relationship between work, school and athletics.

5 . Donna Urquhart is an experienced runner. She ran 1,402 kilometers over the course of 28 days in Antarctica (南极洲), _______ the record for the longest-ever run in a polar region.

Urquhart spent 10 months training for the _______, turning to some unusual training methods. A company allowed her to run in a _______ storage unit where she ran in temperatures below zero. Besides, she ran along the beaches with uneven (凹凸不平的) surfaces that are like the _______ grounds in Antarctica. All those proved useful _______.

The difficulties that Urquhart faced in Antarctica were _______: taking in about 5,000 calories each day, _______ in a tent. Combined with the sound of _______ winds and the continent’s 24 hours of sunlight in the summer months, these were _______ favorable to a good night’s sleep. Urquhart would usually wear four layers of coats and keep ________ her own body temperature while running.

Urquhart launched the Run Antarctica aiming to encourage more women to ________ sport. Though still unsure about what her next running challenge will have, she has set a ________ of raising $1.5 million for charity.

“Confidence is a real issue for females,” says Urquhart. “And a sporting environment provides them with a great opportunity to ________ themselves.” This served as a huge ________ for her to take on a challenge that no other woman had attempted before. “It was actually showing that we can push our ________, and explore what seems impossible,” says Urquhart.

6 . “Have you ever considered giving up during a race?” a runner asked me during the Geneva Marathon. We’d _________ and keeping going felt like walking through a marsh (沼泽). Even the appealing scenery along the way wasn’t enough to _________ our spirits.

“I can’t think of a single race when I haven’t!” I answered _________. The runner beside me looked a little relived. Encouraged, I went on to _________ a few of the weak moments I’d overcome to persuade her to _________. My biggest _________ came during the first half of the 56-mile Marathon in South Africa, I told her. Running it was a _________ dream, but when I found myself on a steep hill with painful blisters (水疱) between my toes after a(n) _________ decision to wear no socks.

“If I give up now, I’ll _________ myself six hours of pain,” I continued. In that moment, 1,000 km of __________ training and the thousands of pounds I’d spent on flights and accommodation didn’t __________ at all.

__________, someone at my running club had laughed at the idea of a slow runner like me entering the marathon like this, and recalling this inspired me to keep moving.

“I may not finish this race before the 12-hour __________, but I’m not going to give that man the chance to say, “I told you so”, I said. Soon afterwards, I buddied up with another __________, a six-hour chat __________ and we got each other to the finish with 17 minutes to spare.

7 . Martin is a certified personal trainer for more than 30 years. He recently ______ a nonprofit organization, Fit2Give, to provide free personal training to ______ communities. Not everyone can attend a group exercise class — some need a one-on-one ______.

“The trainers will be paid; that’s why we’re taking ______,” Martin says. “We’re paying for their certification and their ______ and their ability to establish a ______ relationship with someone.”

Martin’s own ______ to fitness started when he was young. Later, he was attracted to weights and started visiting the gym. “While I was ______ at the gym, a supervisor suggested I take the exam and become a trainer,” he ______. “They loaned me their book. I took the exam. I ______.”

Martin has been supporting people’s fitness goals, which brings Martin ______. He says one client who lost 100 pounds through ______ diet and exercise. “At her weigh-in, her family was there, and they came up to me in ______ and said, ‘We thank you so much. Our mom, she’s like a ______ person.’ It was ______ to me that not only had I affected her, I had affected her family. That warmed my heart.”

8 . On nothing but a “wooden board and four wheels”, a group of women are speeding down windy mountain roads. For most people, this could sound _________. But for Anna Pixner, downhill skateboarding at speed brings a _________ feeling: freedom.

Austrian Pixner got _________ in this sport six years ago. When she started competing, she would _________ in crowds of hundreds of men. Journalists point out that she is a(n)_________ in this male-dominated sport, but Pixner has tired of such _________. “There’s not that much of a difference except that we _________ started a bit later. There is no media about it... if you never saw a woman doing that, it’s harder to get the _________ to do that.”

That is about to _________: Pixner’s journey is captured in a new film “Woolf Women,” which __________ her 5,700-kilometer journey with four other young women across Europe in 2019. One of the central __________ of the film is mental health. Pixner says she finds skating helpful to all kinds of mental issues. “For myself, I __________ it too. I used to be extremely anxious and skateboarding absolutely __________ me.”

Though skateboarding was once a sport on the __________ of society, it is now becoming more mainstream, and in 2021 became an Olympic event. Pixner hopes that downhill skateboarding will soon __________ its appeal to more youngsters.

9 . Photographers from China were among the top prize winners at the 14th Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition, organized by the Royal Observatory Greenwich, in London.

Chinese photographers featured significantly and won _________ in three categories and one of the individual awards, with the most remarkable _________ being the young photographer award, jointly won by Yang Hanwen and Zhou Zezhen, both aged 14, for their _________: Andromeda Galaxy: The Neighbor.

The official awards news release described their picture as “a _________ photograph of one of the Milky Way’s closest and largest neighbors” that showed the lively _________ of a nearby galaxy, stars piercing (穿透) through the _________ and emphasized the wonder of the magnificent sight.

The image was _________ by Laszlo Francsics, one of this year’s judges. “It is an excellent sight _________   by young Chinese teenagers, who also demonstrate their extraordinary talent in _________ a deep-sky photo,” says Francsics.

Hanwen, one of the two Chinese winners, says, “I think this photo shows how __________ our nearest neighbor is.” “One of the main functions (功能) of the competition is to __________ more people to fall in love with astronomy by showing the beauty of the __________,” says Zezhen, the other teenager who won the award.

“The __________ for the competition is incredibly high,” says Ed Bloomer, an astronomer. “It was really satisfying to see how many competitors __________ themselves to capture unusual, rarely imaged or __________ events: There are some things you won’t have seen before, and even some things that won’t be seen again.”

10 . On a recent Sunday morning jog through Prospect Park, Martinus Evans was received like a conquering champion. Every few minutes, a passing _________ would smile and nod, congratulating him as they _________.

Mr Evans is the _________ of Slow AF Run Club. At 300 pounds, he is a _________ figure among runners who have felt left out of the sport. He’s graced the cover of Runner’s World and _________ in the ads of sports brands. And this month, he’s releasing his first book.

The idea for the club was born at about mile 16 of the 2018 New York City Marathon, just after the tiring Queensboro Bridge into Manhattan. Mr Evans was running along when he _________ a man gesturing from the sidelines.

“You’re _________, buddy,” the man shouted, adding an impolite word to indicate just how slow. “Go home.” Mr Evans tried to _________him, and turned his attention back to the _________. Six hours behind the winner, he __________ finished it in over eight hours. But as the bystander repeated his __________ word, Mr Evans got angrier-then __________. The next time he raced, he wore a shirt with that man's phrase, and a cartoon of a smiling turtle. When he __________ photos of his new uniform on social media, __________ asked for shirts of their own. By early 2019, his running club was born.

He said his driving message is simple: “I want everyone to know that they can run in the __________ they have right now.”