Unit 2 Sports culture 译林牛津2020版选择性必修二阅读与单词.docxVIP

X2U2-Sports Culture PAGE PAGE 1 The Olympic Games Every four years, thousands of highly trained and talented athletes gather together in the spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play, ready to test their abilities against each other in the hope of being recognized as the best of the best. This is the Olympics—an extraordinary sporting event that was first celebrated about 3,000 years ago. [Subheading 1] ____________________________ The ancient Olympic Games began in the year 776 BCE. During the early Games, only Greek men were allowed to participate. They competed in such events as boxing, running and the long jump. The ancient Olympic Games were held at Olympia in Greece every four years for almost 12 centuries, until they eventually died out around the year 393. More than 1,500 years later, however, the Games rose again. The modern Olympics were first held in 1896, in Athens. It was a Frenchman, Pierre de Coubertin, who brought the Olympics back to life. His dream was that the Olympics would help people of different racial origins and from different cultures live side by side in peace. For over a century, people from diverse backgrounds have made joint efforts to help realize Coubertin’s dream. [Subheading 2] ____________________________ Motivated by the Olympic motto “Faster, Higher, Stronger”, many well-known athletes, both male and female, have devoted themselves to achieving sporting excellence and pushing the boundaries of human achievement. One such Olympian was the boxer Cassius Clay. He came to public attention during the 1960 Rome Olympics, when he won the light-heavyweight gold medal for the USA, demonstrating great talent and personality in the process. Afterwards, this young man proceeded to become the world heavyweight champion in 1964, and later changed his name to the one we all know—Muhammad Ali. He returned to the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games to light the Olympic flame at the opening ceremony. By the time he died in 2016, Ali had bee