IELTS Reading: sport and leisure passages
Sport, games, toys and hobbies, and the science and history behind them.
14 passages mainly about sport and leisure · 15 more that touch on it · from 28 full tests
Passages mainly about sport and leisure
Each passage opens as a timed 20-minute practice with its 13–14 questions. Submit to see your band estimate and the sentence that proves every answer.
- Games of the Sacred Truce
- Playing for the Nation
- The Rise of Competitive Gaming
- The Machine on the Touchline
- Playing for a Penny
- Should Heading the Ball Be Banned in Youth Football?
- Should Boxing Be Banned?
- Forty-Two Kilometres of Legend
- Replaying the Game
- How Many Should Stand on the Summit?
- Should the Olympic Games Have a Permanent Home?
- Should High-Technology Running Shoes Be Banned?
- The First Modern Olympic Games
- Should Prize Money in Sport Be Equal for Men and Women?
Other passages that cover sport and leisure
These passages have a different main subject but deal with sport and leisure along the way.
15 passages
- The Case for Risky Play
- From Chaturanga to the Global Game
- The Running Ape
- Paying for Surprise: The Argument over Loot Boxes
- The Playroom Goes Online
- Should the History of Sport Be Taught as History?
- Building Muscle
- Who Pays for the Fall?
- Should Schools Make Pupils Run a Mile Every Day?
- Should the Big Match Be Free to Watch?
- Who Should Own a Sports Club?
- Should Competitive Sport Be Compulsory in Schools?
- The Birth of the Modern Circus
- A Grid of Thirty Words
- Should Every Child Learn to Swim at School?
Key sport and leisure vocabulary
Words worth knowing before you read about sport and leisure, each with the sentence it appears in.
| Word | Meaning | Example from a passage |
|---|---|---|
| rudimentary adjective | simple and basic, not developed in detail | “The course was roughly forty kilometres long and the rules were rudimentary” Test 448 |
| dispatched verb | sent somewhere for a particular purpose | “being dispatched to Sparta to request military help” Test 448 |
| deception noun | the act of deliberately making someone believe something untrue | “before the deception was exposed and he was disqualified” Test 448 |
| climax noun | the most exciting or important final part of something | “the race became the traditional climax of the Olympic athletics programme” Test 448 |
| gasped verb | spoke while struggling to breathe | “he is said to have gasped out a single word” Test 448 |
| scrutinised verb | examined very closely and critically | “Officials who know that every decision may be scrutinised become hesitant” Test 448 |
| overturn verb | officially cancel or reverse a decision | “that technology should overturn an official only when it is decisive” Test 448 |
| marginal adjective | too close or slight to be clearly decided | “Both retain the on-field decision when the evidence is marginal” Test 448 |
| eroded verb | gradually worn away or weakened over time | “the authority they need in order to control a fast and physical game is gradually eroded” Test 448 |
| conceals verb | hides something from view or understanding | “sounds precise, but it conceals a judgement of degree that two reasonable people” Test 448 |
| administered verb | managed and controlled by a particular authority | “The two sides of Everest are administered under different rules and different fees” Test 464 |
| finite adjective | limited in amount and not able to be increased indefinitely | “The mountain is a finite resource, the season is short” Test 464 |
| staggered verb | arranged so that events happen at different times, not together | “departure times from the highest camp should be staggered” Test 464 |
| blunt instrument phrase | a method too simple or crude for a complicated problem | “A cap, it is said, is a blunt instrument that would treat a problem of a few days” Test 464 |
| accumulate verb | to increase in quantity over time as more is added | “rubbish and human waste accumulate in the ice” Test 464 |
| outlast verb | continues to exist for longer than something else | “The consequences can outlast the event by decades” Test 466 |
| incentive noun | a reason that makes someone want to act in a particular way | “A permanent host would have no such incentive, and the rest of the world would never see the investment” Test 466 |
| dismantled verb | taken apart into separate pieces | “venues that already exist, or that can be dismantled afterwards” Test 466 |
| regeneration noun | the process of making a run-down urban area successful again | “promises of lasting regeneration are met more often in some cities than in others” Test 466 |
| extravagance noun | the spending of far more money than is necessary | “The extravagance of the Games lies less in the fact that they move” Test 466 |
| prototype noun | an early version of a product, made to test how it performs | “a prototype shoe with a sole almost four centimetres thick and a stiff plate hidden inside it” Test 481 |
| denounced verb | publicly criticised something as wrong or unacceptable | “Every era has had its technological advance, and each was denounced in its turn” Test 481 |
| precedent noun | an earlier case used as an example for deciding a later one | “Swimming offers the clearest precedent, because the sport faced a similar question only a decade ago.” Test 481 |
| enforcement noun | the process of making sure that rules are actually obeyed | “Enforcement will not be easy, since officials cannot cut open a shoe on the start line” Test 481 |
Question types in these passages
- Multiple choice · 16 passages
- Yes / No / Not Given · 16 passages
- Summary completion (word list) · 8 passages
- True / False / Not Given · 7 passages
- Matching information · 6 passages
- Flow-chart completion · 5 passages
- Matching sentence endings · 4 passages
- Matching headings · 4 passages
- Summary completion · 4 passages
- Short-answer questions · 3 passages
- Table completion · 3 passages
- Multiple choice (choose more than one) · 3 passages
- Matching features · 3 passages
- Sentence completion · 2 passages