Need more excitement in your life? Maybe it’s time to take up an extreme sport!

【小题1】 Each year they are becoming more and more popular.Some examples of extreme sports include base jumping, ice climbing, cave diving, and...cheese rolling?!

No one knows exactly how it started, but Cooper’s Hill Cheese­Rolling Race is an annual event that has taken place for over 100 years.The name comes from Cooper’s Hill where the “sport” takes place, just outside the village of Brockworth, England.

【小题2】 A wheel of cheese is thrown down a hill while a group of people chase after it, trying to be the first to catch it or reach the bottom of the hill.The cheese weighs just over 3kg and picks up a lot of speed travelling down the very steep slope(斜坡). 【小题3】 And if you come second or third you’ll receive ￡10. Incredibly, the event has become so popular that people travel from all over the world to take part—even from as far away as Canada and Australia.

But what makes the sport so extreme, and why has the local government tried to ban the tradition? Injuries—and lots of them.The hill is so steep that it’s not actually possible to run down it.【小题4】 Ambulances arrive at the event before the race even starts in preparation for all those who will need a trip to the hospital.Go to YouTube and search for “Gloucestershire Cheese Rolling” to see the event in action.【小题5】 Maybe you will want to have a try someday.

Pleasanton Partnerships in Education Foundation (PPIE) was started in 1987 to raise money by organizing running events for local schools. Based in Pleasanton, California, a suburb of San Francisco, the non-profit organization recently hosted a family focused fitness event for the community. “Our event helps to bring the community together,” said Mindy Louie, events and outreach manager for PPIE. “We have more than 3,000 participants, hard-working volunteers and viewers.”

This year’s fitness event took place on April 30 at the Alameda County Fairgrounds. It featured races of two miles, five kilometers and ten kilometers. A new Kids Challenge consisted of a quarter-mile run to encourage younger children to participate. When asked to describe the run, 11-year-old Jeremy Louie said, “Fun, exciting and enjoyable.” Jeremy added that he was happy to help support his school.

PPIE supports all 15 schools in the Pleasanton Unified School District, which include more than 14,500 students and 800 teachers and staff. The nonprofit organization tries to fund programs affected by budget cuts, while encouraging fitness and athleticism. To date, the PPIE has raised over $1 million for the school district.

A local runners’ group called the BURN Youth Development (B. Y. D.) participated in the fundraising. The B. Y. D. has since grown to more than 100 youth members, 30 of whom ran in April’s PPIE event. Jerry Wu, the group’s founder and lead coach, explained that the B. Y. D. was born to keep kids running. “Watching them running strongly and happily makes me smile every time,” Jerry said.

Jerry encourages teamwork and teaches the students valuable running techniques. As a B. Y. D. member, Ollie Gu, an eighth grader, was one of the top finishers in the ten-kilometer run. He completed the race in 40 minutes and 46 seconds and won first place in the 12- to 15-year-old age group. “The race was extremely rewarding,” Ollie said. “I’m looking forward to it next year.”

The days when art was an Olympic sport

Did you know that creating works of art used to be an Olympic competition? 【小题1】 In the first year, Walter Winans became the first and the only Olympian to win medals for both art and sports. Despite this seemingly optimistic start, the idea of the arts being included in the Olympic Games soon met with disinterest, finally resulting in the removal of the art competition from the Olympic Games.

The idea to include art in the Olympics came from Baron Pierre de Coubertin, who was the founder of the International Olympic Committee, which created the modern Olympics. Coubertin believed that the arts and sports were linked and was impressed by anyone who had a firm command of both a sport and an artistic discipline.

For starters, only amateurs were allowed to compete in the arts part of the Olympics. 【小题3】 Having artists of average quality competing while only the most competent athletes were allowed to compete created a dramatic divide and gave the impression that the arts were not as important as sports.

Secondly, works of art created had to have sports as the subject matter. 【小题4】 Limiting the subjects also contributed to making the arts part of the Olympic Games boring to the general public.

Finally, one of the biggest reasons was that the arts are subjective. Sports can be judged by time and distance, making it easy to determine who is the winner. 【小题5】 This difficulty in judging a definite winner resulted in the arts part becoming a non-competitive exhibition that ran for the duration of the Olympic Games.