If you say you’ve never played it, you’re lying. The game that requires only a balloon, and with the simplest of rules—do not let it touch the floor. And now, it has an official World Cup—the Balloon World Cup.

Organized by Barcelona and former Spain football star Gerard Pique and Internet celebrity (网红) Ibai Llanos, the first tournament (锦标赛) took place in Tarragona, Spain, on an 8m×8m court, which had living room furniture and a small car as obstacles. Peru’s Francesco de la Cruz became the very first balloon world champion.

“It’s been amazing, it’s something totally different. Sometimes you have to get out of your comfort zone and try new things,” said Pique, for whom this is not the first sporting business project away from the football field—he was also behind some other sports events.

The tournament was inspired by a series of popular videos from the Arrendondo family from Oregon, United States, with brothers and sister Antonio, Diego and Isabel playing the game during Covid-19 lockdown and posting the fun on Tik-Tok. Antonio and Diego teamed up to play in the World Cup, with teams from 32 countries taking part. 

“We played the game as kids, and then, during the start of quarantine (隔离) for Covid, we wanted to play it again,” Antonio said. “We started arguing with each other over whether it hit the ground or not, so we started taking videos in slow-mo (慢动作) to see if it did, and then finally it got to the point of let’s post this video of us on Tik-Tok.” “When I woke up the next morning it went viral, with a million likes, and then after that we just decided to keep playing and played more and more until one of our rounds got the attention of Ibai and Pique.” Antonio added.

De la Cruz, who beat German Jan Spiess 6-2 in the final, said: “I am very, very happy, I thank God that I have been able to achieve this.”

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1.What can be inferred from paragraphs 1 and 2?

A The author thinks few people played the game before.

B Many people organized the balloon tournament together.

C Living room furniture and a small car make the game harder.

D The very first balloon world champion comes from Spain.

解析：选C。C 推理判断题。根据第一和第二段可知，作者认为如果你说你没玩过这个游戏，你就在撒谎，即作者认为大多数人都玩过，A排除；是西班牙足坛明星皮克和网红依拜·利亚诺斯两人在西班牙组织了第一届气球世界杯赛，B排除；冠军来自秘鲁，B项排除；家具和汽车是障碍物，即让游戏更难，故选C。

2.What might be Gerard Pique’s comfort zone?

A The Balloon World Cup.

B The business world.

C The football field.

D The film industry.

解析：选C。C 细节理解题。根据题目comfort zone定位到第三段，可知皮克说要跨出舒适区，尝试新事物，结合第二段football star可知，他的舒适区应该是关于足球的，故选C。

3.What gave the inspiration to the birth of the Balloon World Cup?

A Videos from Tik-Tok.

B The Arrendondo family.

C The Covid-19 lockdown.

D Teams from 32 countries.

解析：选A。A 细节理解题。根据inspiration定位到第四段第一句The tournament was inspired by a series of popular videos，可知举办气球比赛的灵感来源于抖音(Tik-Tok)上一系列受欢迎的视频。这些视频是由阿伦东多家拍摄，视频中兄弟姐妹们在新冠肺炎疫情期间玩气球游戏。故选A。

4.Which can best replace the underlined phrase “went viral” in Paragraph 5?

A Became boring.

B Turned difficult.

C Spread quickly.

D Grew strange.

解析：选C。C 词义猜测题。根据went viral定位到第五段最后一句，可知第二天早上Antonio醒来的时候，他发布的视频收获了一百万点赞，可推知视频走红了，即在社交媒体上传播得很快很广，故选C。