1 . How to overcome gym anxiety

Here are some practical tips to help you overcome anxiety in the gym and create a positive, empowering experience for yourself.

Set realistic expectations

The first step in overcoming gym anxiety is to set realistic expectations. Understand that everyone starts somewhere and that the gym is a place for personal growth and improvement.     1     Every individual in the gym is on their own unique fitness journey.

Plan ahead and familiarise yourself

    2     Before heading to the gym, plan your workout routine and familiarise yourself with the equipment you intend to use. Research exercise techniques and watch instructional videos to gain confidence and knowledge. By doing so, you’ll enter the gym with a sense of purpose and direction.

Start slowly and gradually

Ease into your gym routine by starting with exercises and machines you are comfortable with.     3     Taking small steps will not only help you build physical strength but also improve your mental resilience (韧性), empowering you to tackle new challenges.

    4    

Having a gym partner can provide huge support and motivation. Consider finding a friend who shares your fitness goals or seeking guidance from a personal trainer. A supportive companion or an expert can provide guidance, encourage you during workouts, and help remove anxiety by offering tips and feedback.

Practice mindfulness techniques

Mindfulness exercises can be powerful tools to fight anxiety in any setting, including the gym.     5     Focusing on your breath and being present in the moment can help calm your mind and remove anxiety. Additionally, practicing mindfulness during your workout can enhance your mind-body connection, allowing you to fully involve yourself in the experience.

4 . Move over soccer, basketball and football, there’s a new competition sweeping Australia. It’s competitive bird calling. Yes, bird calling!

Scores of kids in New South Wales are spending their spare time practicing for the Bournda Bird Olympics, an event that aims at young bird-callers against each other to see who can deliver the clearest, most enthusiastic and most accurate bird call. The principal of the Bournda Environmental Education Centre, Doug Reckord, encourages the kids to listen to bird calls on YouTube to prepare for the event. The children also work on identifying birds by their beaks, claws and calls.

Surprisingly, the Bournda Bird Olympics isn’t Australia’s first competition with competitive bird calling. The first competition took place in Sydney in 1912. It was supported by the Gould League of Bird Lovers, a foundation that encouraged children to bird watch and learn about birds.

Even back then, New South Wales was the country’s bird calling leader. Students from the New South Wales region had access to much more bird sounds than city kids. They won the Dawson Memorial Shield for best bird calling six times between 1953 and 1962. Today, New South Wales is bringing back the bird calls. Led by the Bournda Environmental Education Centre, the Bournda Bird Olympics renewed in 2018. The event now features former bird calling champion, Bruce Chapman, as the “celebrity” judge.

When showtime finally arrives, three judges at the Bournda Bird Olympics rate people taking part on their enthusiasm, accuracy and clearness. The players can earn a maximum of three points in each type. Some 45 children took part in the 2022 event. The most popular bird call to imitate (模仿) was the kookaburra’s unique laugh. But the winner that year came from a girl copying a king parrot. Her call sounded so accurate that a king parrot in the trees actually called back to her.

5 . As the name suggests, alpine football, a variation of the world’s most popular competitive sport, is played on mountain slopes (斜坡) in order to make it more difficult.

Most competitive sports usually take place on level playing fields, but in the case of alpine football, one of the main conditions is that the field must be steep (陡峭的). It sounds totally impossible, but a group of football fans in the Austrian Alps claim that it’s the best way to play their favorite sport. They got the idea for alpine football during the 2014 World Cup, while watching a boring game and brainstorming for ways to make it more challenging.

“We were watching the games and found them very boring,” alpine football co-inventor Franz Mair said. “Then, Peppi Knunz, the other inventor of the sport, said to me, ‘The way they play isn’t hard enough and they should try running up and down our mountains. They’d soon be out of breath.’ And then we thought they might not even be able to play, but we would manage it!”

Flat ground is very hard to find in the Alps, so it’s most often used for more important things than playing football. Therefore, fans of the sport in such mountainous areas decided to turn lemons into lemonade and use the mountain slope to invent a new game. Now, locals take pride in only playing alpine football.

“Anyone can play on flat ground,” says Alois Gantner, trainer of the Supa BUrschis team. “In Montafon, we only play on the steepest slopes we can find.”

The rules of alpine football are the same as for the regular football, with the only difference being the need for strong legs and great energy to fight against gravity on the uneven field.

7 . The final event in the Olympics is the marathon. It is also usually the most exciting. As the leader comes into the stadium to run the last few meters of the 42-kilometer race, the crowd rises to its feet to shout and cheer. The name of the race comes from a battle(战争) in Ancient Greece. According to the story, a soldier ran from the battle field, Marathon, to Athens, to bring the news of a Greek victory against the Persians. He died just after arriving.

The marathon has been an Olympic event since the modern games started in 1896. At first the distance was 40 kilometers—the distance between Marathon and Athens. In 1908, however, at the London Olympics, it was changed. The King of England wanted the runners to leave from his castle in Windsor and arrive in a new stadium in central London. The distance was 26 miles—about 42 kilometers. In fact, the 1908 marathon ended dramatically(戏剧性地). When the leader, an Italian, entered the stadium he turned the wrong way and fell onto the ground. Officials picked him up and helped him to the finishing line, just as the second runner, an American, entered the stadium. The Americans protested(抗议) and in the end the American runner was declared(宣布) the winner. Since then, there have been many more exciting marathons.

In fact, you don’t have to wait for the Olympic Games to run or watch a marathon, as there are marathons in over sixty countries and hundreds of cities around the world today. One of the most famous marathons is in New York, and is watched by two million people around the streets and across the bridges of the city, and past New York’s famous landmarks. But perhaps one of the most beautiful and unique marathons ever is the Great Wall Marathon, which most competitors find is the toughest course to run.

The marathon is the final Olympic event because it is thought to be the hardest. But experts believe that most people—even people who are not very good at sport—can run a marathon, if they train for it.

8 . Below is a list of activities that will get you excited and add a bit of fun into your schedule at the same time.

Ready, set, play!

Join a team sport

Playing sport as part of a team can help you get active while making friends and feeling part of your community. This list of links will lead you through to sports clubs and fixtures across the state, or you can use the My Community directory to search for your sport of choice.

Make date night active night

Date night (or any time you hang with loved ones or friends) doesn’t have to be spent sitting in a cinema. Get active on your next date by going bowling, playing laser tag or paintball, or sinking balls at minigolf.

Catch and kick

Anyone with kids will know that sometimes entertaining them takes priority over looking after your own health. Kill two birds with one stone and take them to the park to kick a footy or throw a ball back and forth. Once everyone’s practised their kicking, throwing and catching skills, take things to the next level by asking them to throw or kick long and make you run for it.

Take the stairs

An oldy but a goody, taking the stairs instead of a lift is great for working the major muscle groups in the legs. It might not seem like the most fun option for a workout, but you can fit a surprising amount of activity into every day by taking the stairs whenever they are an option. And if you get hooked(喜欢上), you can even become a competitive stair climber.

9 . Female figure skaters aren’t really expected to be able to do triple axels(三周半跳). Especially not older ones---in the Olympics, that means older than 20. Mirai Nagasu did both, nailing the jump in competition at 24 during the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea. She was the first American woman to land a triple axel in the Olympic Games-and only the third woman to do it.

Nagasu’s been pursuing her own path since she was just 5. “My parents used to take me golfing(打高尔夫球)every day because that was the career they wanted me to have,” she wrote. “They took me ice skating one day because we couldn’t go golfing due to the rain, and after that, I kept asking to be taken to go skating.” Her ambition paid off eventually, beginning with a host of Four Continents and ISU World Junior Championship medals and ending with two World Championship and two Olympic appearances each.

Unlike other popular athletes who’ve traded childhood for training, Nagasu had to attend public school by day and help her parents in their restaurant by night. “They really taught me to work for what I want,” she said. That lesson was put to the test in 2014, when despite taking third place at the U. S. Figure Skating Championships, Nagasu was passed over for the Olympic team in favor of fourth-place finisher Ashley Wagner. Some athletes might have taken off their skates for good at that point. Instead, Nagasu got a new coach and learned the triple axel. After two years under his instruction, she displayed her new skill in the U. S. National Championships. By the time she tried it on Olympic ice in 2018, she’d perfected it. Nagasu performed the difficult three-and-a-half jump, helping her team win a bronze medal(铜牌) in the end.

10 . What is the best sport for your body type?

Just because someone has dreamt of playing football from childhood does not mean it is the best sport for him or her. Finding the sport your body is best suited to can make a big difference to how much you enjoy it and how good at it you are.

A person with an ectomorph body type is tall and slim with little fat or muscle. This person has narrow shoulders and hips, and thin arms and legs. Ectomorphs have difficulty putting on weight because of a fast metabolism (新陈代谢).     1     . What suits ectomorphs is endurance sports. Marathon running, swimming, and football are excellent choices for them.     2     , basketball may also be a great option.

Mesomorph body types are the typical image of an athlete. Their arms and legs are muscular and they have broad shoulders and narrow hips. Mesomorphs can put on or lose weight easily and build muscle quickly.     3     . Possibilities range from weightlifting and boxing to cycling for shorter distances.

A person who is an endomorph naturally carries more body fat. They are often short, with a high waist, and well developed upper arms and thighs.     4     , they can be very good at power sports because of their larger mass. This body type is not suited for agility (敏捷) and speed, but strength activities like wresting or powerlifting can be a great fit.

It is important to note that the three body types are extremes. No one is 100% ectomorph or completely endomorph.     5     . Another key point is that diet and environment also contribute to athletic ability and genetics plays a large part. And the most important thing is to choose a sport you enjoy.