Angličtina

11. SPORTS AND GAMES

- sport can help us:  keep fit physically and mentally, take off some weight, meet new people, fight stress

We can do sports actively (as professionals, or just as a freetime activity). The majority of people are just spectators: they like watching sports on TV or they visit football or ice-hockey matches as fans.

SOME KINDS OF SPORTS

We can divide sports into groups:

a) according to the place where they are practiced:

1. indoor sports - which are practiced in halls and gyms or indoor swimming pools: gymnastics, table tennis, volleyball, basketball, wrestling, boxing

2. outdoor sports - skiing, hiking, rock climbing, horse riding, golf, rowing, windsurfing, cycling, riding a mountain bike

b) according to the season:

1. summer sports - all "track and field" events: sprints, middle and long distance run, hugh jump, long jump, throwing a javelin, throwing a discus, pole vaulting

2. winter sports - downhill skiing, crosscountry skiing, ice-skating, figure-skating, bob-sledging

Some sports can be practiced both outdoors and indoors, during all seasons. For example swimming. We can swim several styles: crawl, breast stroke, butterfly stroke.

Some sports are called "adrenaline sports" - they are very challenging physically and especially psychically: bungee-jumping or paragliding.

GAMES

The games are usually all-season activities, they can be practiced indoors and outdoors. Football (called soccer in the US), ice-hockey, basketball, handball, volleyball, floorball, rugby etc.

MOST POPULAR GAMES IN THE CR, GB, THE USA

a) in Britain:

The British like playing and watching games, and they also like talking about them. Football belongs to favourite games. There are a great number of clubs (Manchester United, Arsenal). In London there is one of the world's biggest football stadiums: the Wembley Arena.

Rugby football is also very popular. This game was first played at Rugby (a town) school in England. In this game the ball is oval.

Golf is of Scottish origin. Cricket is an English national game.

 Lots of spectators visit horse races. Queen Elizabeth II. loves watching horse-racing. Lots of the British look forward to another sports event: the famous university rowing race between Oxford and Cambridge which is held on the River Thames.

 b) in the USA