Advanced Language Practice Unit 1 Leisure activities (I)

1) It is now generally recognized that stress is a major   of heart disease, and contributes to tướng many other illnesses. Stress is increased by such as worry, overwork and lack of exercise or relaxation. For it is just as important from a psychological point of to tướng relax as it is to tướng physical exercise. Relaxing does not necessarily mean just lazing about and doing nothing. The benefits of a weekend away or the diversion of sporting activities are considerable. If you are suffering from high stress , or wish to tướng after a trying day, it is generally advisable to tướng have a change of . Although there are some individuals who on stress, for most of us, it can lead to tướng exhaustion, mood swings and even severe depression.

3) Last week well over a thousand people our iocal round-the-city 10-kilometre fun lập cập. This kind of race doesn't normally , as,  frankly, Tm not realiy  long distance running. But l've got two friends who are dead keen runners and who keep going on about the  effects of running. So I decided to tướng lập cập, partly for that reason and partly to tướng money for charity. Friends and colleagues agreed to tướng mạ, and pay for each mile I completed. Well, I hadn't done much training for the big sự kiện, and after two kilometres I was for breath, ví I settled down to a slow jog and resigned myself to tướng plodding along with the   at the back of the race. At least I finished, and was very pleased with myself, as I didn't need to tướng stop. I timed myself with a stop-watch, and reckon I the finishing linę in 43 minutes - not bad for a novice. The heat proved too much for a few people who'd gone off too fast for their capabilities and ended up exhaustion. Apparently, the course was very fast, and both of my friends ran a .  The winner  the course record. I was actually very impressed with the whole event; the organization was first-class, with medical volunteers  throughout, and drinks  every few kilometres of the route. So now the charity of my choice is £150 the richer, and as for mạ, l'm well and truły bitten by the running bug. I go running with my friends regularly now, and I'm actually starting to   them!

5) Very few popular  sports today remain amateur in any sense of the word. In the past, even in cases where payment to tướng players or athletes was forbidden, many tolerated what became known as ‘shamateurism’ and even the sports governing  turned a blind eye to tướng such as the paying of expenses. More recently, sport has become, in effect, a of the entertainment industry and the elite in sports such as swimming, tennis, football and track can expect to tướng become very rich. This worries some people, who complain that the old Olympic ideał has been lost, but the fact is, sport has become more and more in the wider sense, not only requiring total dedication from champions, but also expensive facilities, training and nutritional advice. As it is simply no longer possible to tướng combine a career in sport with one elsewhere, shouldn't sportsmen and women be able to tướng earn as much as they can from sport?