The Olympics are a celebration of friendly competition and sportsmanship. Sometimes its easy to forget that once the competition starts and players are trying their hardest to achieve a gold prize. Yesterday the Canadian cross-country skiing coach reminded us all that the Golden Rule （Do others as you would want them to do for you） is more important than a gold medal， even at the Olympics.

Yesterday Russian skier Anton Gafarov suffered not one but three terrible falls in the mens cross-country spring and broke his left ski. His ski was so destroyed that it hardly even looked like a ski and it looked like Gafarov wouldnt even finish the race.

None of the Russian coaches or his teammates rushed out to help Gafarov， so Justin Wadsworth took it upon himself to give the struggling skier a new ski even though he wasnt on his team.

“It was like watching an animal stuck in a trap. You cant just sit there and do nothing about it，” Wadsworth said about Gafarov struggling to complete the last hundred metres of the course.

“I was surprised no one else on the course gave him anything. I went over and gave him one of Alexs spare skis. It was about giving Gafarov some dignity so he didnt have to walk to the finish area，” Wadsworth said.

Gafarov ended up finishing three minutes behind the rest of his competition， and was very sad about how the race went. He hasnt said something about Wadsworths act of kindness yet， but were believing that it meant a lot to him！

Vocabulary

skier n. 滑雪運動員

struggling adj. 掙扎的，奮斗的

dignity n. 自尊

（Would you do the same thing for someone else on another team？）

趙旭鋒整理