Everywhere we look, we see Americans running. They run for every reason anybody could think of: for health, for beauty, to (1)_______________, to feel fit or because it’s the thing they love to do. Every year, for example, thousands upon thousands of people run in one race — the Boston Marathon, the best-known (2)_______________ race in the United States. In recent years, there have been nearly five thousand official (3)_______________ and it takes three whole minutes for the crowd of runners just to cross the (4)_______________. You may have heard of the story of the great runner Pheidippides. He ran from Marathon to Athens to (5)_______________ the news of the great victory 2,500 years ago. No one knows how long it took him to run the distance. But the story tells us that he (6)_______________ the effort. Today no one will die in Marathon race. But the effort is still (7)___________. Someone does come in first in this (8)___________ foot race, but at the finish line we see what this race is about — not being first but finishing. The real victory is not over one’s (9)_______________ but over one’s own body. It’s a victory of (10)_______________ over fatigue. In the Boston Marathon, each person who crosses the finish line is a winner. Play P27_1_mp3.mp3