THEME 2; SPORTS
- Over the past 25 years or so, there has been a sharp increase in the popularity of parachuting as a sport. Parachuting can be learnt at a parachute club. The training is extremely strict. The instructor makes sure that the beginner has learnt and understood everything before the first jump is made.
- Like all parachutists, the beginner must wear two parachutes – a main one on the back and a slightly smaller reserve one on the front. Trainee parachutists do not open their parachutes themselves. By law, they have to make their first six descents using a parachute opened automatically by a 15-foot nylon static line fixed to the airplane. It takes about 2.7 seconds for the jumper’s weight to pull on the line, and thus open the parachute.
- Trainees are taught how to ‘spreadeagle’ – to lie stomach down and stretch their arms and legs out to slow down their fall. In this way, they descend at about 120 miles per hour before the parachute opens, whereas an experienced sky-diver, descending headfirst, can travel at over 200 mph. Novices jump from a height of about 2,500 feet, while experienced free-fallers may jump from well over 7,000 feet, waiting until they are within 2,000 feet off the ground before pulling the ripcord to open their parachutes.
- What do the following refer to?
- ‘one’ (para. 2):______________________________________________________________________
- ‘they’ (para. 2):_____________________________________________________________________
- ‘In this way’ (para. 3):________________________________________________________________
- ‘their parachutes’ (para. 3): the parachutes of______________________________________________
- What do the following mean?
- ‘descents’ (para. 2):_______________________________
- ‘Novices’ (para. 3):_______________________________
III. Answer the following questions.
- What is a parachute club?
|How does a
||parachute open automatically?
|What happens as a result of spreadeagling?
|How does a
|How and when
||en do experienced jumpers open
||Part of Speech
||Pattern + Definition +Collocations
||Context in which the word/phrase is used
||noun [C] verb [I, T]
||an increase in sth: a rise in the amount, number or value of sth
||Over the past 25 years or so, there has been a sharp increase in the popularity of parachuting as a sport.
||verb + adj.
||make sure that … : to do sth in order to be certain that sth else happens
||The instructor makes sure that the beginner has learnt and understood everything ….
||verb [I] noun [C, U]
||to come or go down from a higher to a lower In this way, they descend at about level 120 miles per hour before the make a descent parachute opens, whereas an
experienced sky-diver, descending head first, can travel at over 200 mph.