Sports and Games – maturitná otázka

Sports and Games

Introduction

Sports and games are activities that are well known for everybody of us. People started to do sports and play games many years ago, but the biggest boom was in this century. With coming of new technologies people got new possibilities and new ideas how to spend their spare time for pleasure, but only for it. People do the sports because they want to keep fit, build their muscles and make their body better for look. It is also very good (the best) kind of relaxation. It helps to keep our mental health in order. The majority of people do the sports as a hobby but some people do the sport as a job.

Kinds of sports

• Season sports: summer, winter, seasonal...
• Outdoors: baseball, golf, gliding, skiing...
• Indoors: table-tennis, gymnastic, chess
• Social: all teams games (football, volleyball)
• Single: chess, golf, athletics...
• Water, ball games...

Typical sports for

Great Britain

• Many sports have their origins in Britain that is why Britain is sometimes called the cradle of sports
• Cricket – real English game, it has never spread in foreign countries, it is intensively played only in the UK, Australia and some other Commonwealth countries; it is played on a cricket field of approximately size of two pitches, two teams of 11 members, they use cricket-bat and a small leather-ball.
• Golf – has its origins in Scotland
• Football – the most popular game in Britain;
• Tennis, Squash
• They don’t play volleyball at all

The USA

• Baseball, Rugby, Basketball, Motor racing, Ice-hockey (Canada)...

The Czech Republic

• Football, Ice-hockey, Tennis, Volleyball...

Rules and equipment

When you want to do some sport you firstly need to know the rules. If don’t know it you may be sent off the play or you don’t achieve the best results (score) you could. You nearly always need some equipment for doing it. For instance when you play golf you has to have lot of equipment – different kinds of sticks, balls, special trolley. For some sports you don’t need nearly anything, just your body (volleyball – only good shoes and kneecap).

Volleyball

• is a team sport that you can play both outside and inside
• it is played on a volleyball court of size 9 by 18 metres, there is a net across the court, which is in a height of 2,43m
• you play with a white ball (now it also can be coloured)
• the team consists of six players (2 of them are smash-men, 2 of them make a blockade, 2 of them pass the ball to smash-men who should score)
• it is important to make the ball touch the rival’s side of the court – it make a point for you; it is played till one team reaches 25 points – it means that they win a set, when you win two sets you also win the match

Important sport events

The Olympic Games

• are the most famous sport event in the world
• people represent their own country, more than 30 sport events
• they are held every four years, they have their summer and winter parts which change once every two years
• the first Olympic Games took place in Olympia, Greece in the year 776 B.C., there exist many legends – the story of the marathon (in 490 a Greek runner ran about 42 km. from Marathon to Athens; he was bringing news of the Battle of Athens; but he ran too tar, too fast; he died from exhaustion)
• symbol of the Games is The Olympic Flag – there are five connected circles, each symbolised one continent (blue – Europe, black – Africa, red – America, yellow – Asia, green – Australia); and The Olympic Fire – it is traditionally lighted in Greek Olympia and moved to the city in which the Games are taking place, it burns during the OG

Other Events

Wimbledon – the most famous tennis tournament in the world, Czech republic belong to the first class, it takes place in GB

World Championships in F1, hockey, football, World Cups...

Sport at school/clubs

School

• at school we have our physical training lessons two times a week
• we exercise in the sport hall (gymnastic) and in the summer out (athletics)
• we practise gym and sometimes we play volleyball or other games – we have a few competitions between classes

Clubs

• you can improve yourself, because at school you don’t have time for it and not everybody like the sport that you like
• there is a lot of fun there, you might achieve some success there

The effect on a nation of sporting success

I think that nearly everybody is very happy, people celebrate, they realise that they are Czech – they are proud of this country, it can join people who don’t like each other together. The country became known all over the world. (the Winter Olympic Games in Nagano, Jan Želazný – throwing the javelin, Jana Novotná, Petr Korda, Ivan Lendl)...

Other

Sport as a hobby

• sport could be very funny and what is very important, nearly everybody can do some sport activity
• sport keeps us healthy not only physical, but psychical, too
• we can do sport with our friends, or meet a lot of new interesting people
• sport teaches us, how to improve our condition and some kinds of sports could us teach how to be more responsible and fair
• but you must be careful and don’t overestimate your power

Sport as a profession

• it is very hard work, you have to be very good at it if you want to be famous
• you can earn a lot of money and meet famous people
• but it could be very dangerous for your body. Some kinds of sports – athletics, are very dangerous for your muscles – you can stretch your muscles, and your joins very suffer
• there is a big danger of anabolic steroids (synthetic hormone) – if you take it, it destroys your body very much
• you have to be very careful of every kinds of injuries, because it could be the end of you carrier
• if you are top sportsman, you have to keep very strictly rules and your private life is under the control, too
• you must know the rules and respect them
• must have a good equipment and trainer

My attitude to sports

I like doing sport. I used to play tennis for ten years but I stopped doing this, because it was more and more expensive. Now I play table tennis, volleyball, and basketball. I like florball very much but I have nowhere to do that. Last year I start doing roller-skating. I’d like to improve in it. There is not enough equipment in Hlučín. But in Ostrava there is very good skate park with special equipment like funbox, radius, U-ramp etc. Someone can found in boring but I like doing and inventing new figures which are more difficult and sometimes more dangerous. I’d like to try squash as well. When I have lots of money I will try bungee-jumping. It must be exciting. Or I’ll try paraschoting, it must be greatfull to fall down through air. I also like swimming. I can swim for a long time but I am not very fast. I do cycling very often. I like cycling to far distances. In winter I play ice hockey. I don’t know why but I hate football. It’s an only one sport I really don’t like. It’s maybe because when I was smaller everybody used to play football but I used to play tennis.

Is it important to win?

In generally it isn’t important to win. It’s important to take part in. I don’t do sport to beat someone I do it because it’s fun, because I like it, to relax, forgot about everything. But it’s great to win. You know that you are good at it and that you are better than someone else ant it gives you self-confidence. I often lose but I don’t mind it because I know that someone is better than me and I can learn from him. For someone is very important to win so he use steroids to insure himself. There was for example big affair with Petr Korda last year.

Vocabulary

athlete atlet

athletics track ateltická dráha

boxing ring boxerský ring

football pitch fotbalové hřiště

golf course golfová dráha

health zdraví

lifeguard plavčík

medal medajle

referee rozhodčí

runner, sprinter běžec

skating rink kluziště

ski slope lyžařský svah

stadium stadión

stamina vytrvalost

start line startovní čára

strength síla

swimming pool bazén

tennis court tenisový kurt

track dráha

vitality vitalita, životní síla

Equipment:

bat pálka

beam kladina

box švédská bedna

climbing ropes lana na šplhání

club pálka

cricket/baseball bat pálka na criket/baseball

croquet/polo mallet palice na kriket/pólo

dumb-bells činky

goal branka, brána; gól

golf club golfová hůl

hockey stick hokejka

hoop obruč

hurdles překá_ky

landing mat žíněnka

net síť

parallel bars bradla

racket raketa

relay štafetový kolík

rings kruhy

seats lavičky

skipping-rope švihadlo

spikes tertry

starting block startovní blok

stopwatch stopky

vaulting horse kůň (nářadí)

wall bars žebřiny

Sports:

aviation, flying létání

archery lukostřelba

athletics atletika

badminton badminton

ball throwing vrh koulí

baseball baseball

basketball košíková

billiards, snooker kulečník

bowling kuželky

boxing box

canoeing kanoistika

car racing formule

climbing horolezectví

competitive walking závodní chůze

croquet kroket

cross-country skiing přespolní lyžování

cycling cyklistika

darts šipky

diving potápění

down-hill skiing sjezd

fancy diving skoky do vody

fencing šerm

fishing, angling rybolov

floorball, florbal

football fotbal

gliding bezmotorové létání

golf golf

gymnastics gymnastika

handball házená

hand gliding létání na kluzáku

high jump skok vysoký

hiking pěší turistika

hockey hokej

horse riding jezdectví

chess šachy

javelin throw vrh oštěpem

judo judo

karate karate

long jump skok daleký

marathon maratón

motorcycling motocyklistika

mountaineering horolezectví

pole vault skok o tyči

powertraining posilování

relay race štafetový běh

roller-skating jízda na koleč. bruslích

rowing veslování

rugby ragby

scrambling motokros

shooting střelba

skating bruslení

skiing lyžování

ski-jump skoky na lyžích

slalom slalom

sledding sáňkování

soccer fotbal (v USA)

sprint sprint

squash squash

steeplechase překážkový běh

swimming plavání

table–tennis stolní tenis

tennis tenis

throwing the discus hod diskem

triple jump trojskok

volleyball voleybal

water polo vodní pólo

water skiing vodní lyžování

weight lifting vzpírání

windsurfing windsurfing

wrestling zápas

yachting jachtink