Gold First Coursebook Audio Script
Unit 9, Speaking Focus Activity 2
Track 2.05
Interviewer:What do you think makes some people more successful at sport than other
people?
Speaker A: I’m sorry, did you say successful?
Interviewer: Yes, that’s right.
Speaker A: Thanks. Well, it’s difficult to say, of course, but I suppose a lot depends on your
personality: whether you are self– er, I mean sure of your ability.
Speaker B: Yes, and also really really want to win. You have to be, er, hungry. What I’m
trying to say is you need to be very determined.
Speaker A: But it’s not enough if you– you need the ability in the first place otherwise it
doesn’t matter how you are– or rather, how ambitious you are.
Speaker B: Maybe but some people say if you practise a lot–
Speaker A: Yes but it isn’t enough. There is also– Right, er… you need a good body, for
example good health and…
Unit 9, Speaking Focus Activity 4
Track 2.06
Speaker: Do you mean …?
I’m sorry, did you say …?
So what you’re saying is …?
OK, let me see.
Well, it’s difficult to say, of course …
As far as I know, …
Right, …
I mean …
What I meant was …
What I’m trying to say is …
…or rather, …
Unit 9, Listening Focus Activity 2
Track 2.07
Speaker: What is it that makes a champion? How much is sporting achievement down to
the ability you’re born with and how much to effort? And what part does luck
play in the difference between winning and losing? Most top sportspeople claim
that their success is down to dedication, ambition and long hours of practice.
Luck is rarely mentioned; unless they happen to lose and that’s sometimes
blamed on something they couldn’t control, like the weather.
Unit 9, Listening Focus Activity 3
Track 2.08
Man: What is it that makes a champion? How much is sporting achievement down to
the ability you’re born with and how much to effort. And what part does luck
play in the difference between winning and losing? Most top sportspeople claim
that their success is down to dedication, ambition and long hours of practice.
Luck is rarely mentioned; unless they happen to lose, and that’s sometimes
blamed on something they couldn’t control, like the weather.
One thing that’s clear is that standards in sport are getting higher, and records
go on being broken year after year. But is this because athletes are bigger and
stronger than they were twenty, fifty, a hundred years ago? Or is it because
sportspeople are getting more talented? Well, experts say physical changes
develop over a much longer time span. So it must be that people are practising
longer and harder, and striving to achieve more. Sure, improvements in running
shoes, tennis rackets and other technological advances play their part, but they
can’t account on their own for the differences in standards.
It could be that sportspeople are able to achieve more these days because their
talent is recognised and nourished at a younger and younger age. Just look at
the quality of junior tennis at incredibly successful clubs like Spartak in Moscow.
In recent years this club’s created more top twenty women players than the
whole of the United States. But a seemingly exceptional natural talent in a young
child is often only the product of hours and hours of expert tuition and practice,
and the child is unlikely to continue to make progress at such a fast rate.
Matthew Syed, in his book Bounce, examines the relationship between talent,
success and luck. Matthew was a British number one and top international table
tennis player during the late 1990s. He lists several factors which he believes
contributed to his success and which had very little to do with his own talent.
Matthew says his first piece of good fortune was that when he was eight, his
parents decided to buy a full-size, professional table-tennis table, which they
kept in the garage, as a way of keeping their boys occupied and out of trouble.
Matthew says he was also lucky that his older brother loved the game as much
as he did and was happy to fight out endless battles in the garage.
Matthew and his brother were spotted by one of the leading table tennis coaches
in the country, Peter Charters, who just happened to be a teacher at Matthew’s
primary school. He invited the boys to join the Omega Club. It wasn’t a big or
well-known club in those days but the tiny group of members could play
whenever they liked, day or night, even though there was only one table and it
was freezing in winter and incredibly hot in summer.
Under the eye of Peter Charters, the Omega club members began having
considerable success and started to attract a lot of attention. The street where
Matthew lived, Silverdale Road, contained an astonishing number of the
country’s top players, including both the men’s and women’s future
Commonwealth champions. Was this inevitable, given the quality of the coach,
the talent of the players and the location of the Omega club, or was it, as
Matthew believes, just a combination of lucky events? If he hadn’t lived in
Silverdale Road, he would’ve gone to a different school and he wouldn’t have
met Peter Charters, nor become a member of the Omega Club.
Still, Matthew shouldn’t underestimate his own part in his success. A ten year
investigation into what makes people lucky or unlucky has concluded that people
do make their own luck Obviously, Matthew couldn’t have succeeded without
some raw talent, but he also took full advantage of the opportunities given to
him, and this is what ultimately made him so successful. Lucky people are better
at taking chances and finding ways to improve their situation. Unlucky people
are less likely to take risks and don’t like change. If there are lessons to be
learned...