prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: The 2011 La Manga Cup was won by Viking, who beat which Norwegian football club from the town of Kristiansand, currently playing in Tippeligaen having been promoted from Adeccoligaen in 2012?

The following are given passages.
Context 1: Passage 1:
Sarpsborg 08 FF
Sarpsborg 08 Fotballforening, commonly known as Sarpsborg 08 or simply Sarpsborg ([ˈsɑ̀ʂbɔr]), is a Norwegian football club based in Sarpsborg, playing in Eliteserien  Sarpsborg 08 and its predecessors played in 1  divisjon from 2005 to 2010  In 2010, the club was promoted to the Tippeligaen, the top league in Norway, but finished last and was relegated back to 1  divisjon in 2011  In 2012, they were promoted again and 6 years after, they qualified for their first Europa League group stage  They play their home games at Sarpsborg Stadion 

History
Pre-existence
Football in Sarpsborg has traditionally been dominated by Sarpsborg FK (SFK), which won the Norwegian Cup six times and played 20 seasons in the top division, and to a lesser extent IL Sparta, which won the Norwegian Cup in 1952 and played nine seasons in the top division  However, after SFK's relegation from the 1974, no teams from Sarpsborg played in the top division for the next two decades  In 1999, 16 teams in the Sarpsborg area joined forces to create a team that could compete in the top divisions of Norwegian football, called Sarpsborg Fotball, which overtook SFK's spot in the league-system  In its first season, the team was relegated from the 2  divisjon, and several clubs, including both SFK and Sparta, withdrew from the collaboration 
The remaining clubs in the "Sarpsborg Fotball" project formed a new club called Borg Fotball, which won promotion to the 2  divisjon in 2002, but was relegated again in 2003  Meanwhile, Sparta was promoted to the Second Division the same season, and re-entered the collaboration club which now was renamed FK Sparta Sarpsborg  The club earned promotion to 1  divisjon (the second tier of Norwegian football) in 2005 

Foundation
At the end of the 2007 season, the last major club in the district, Sarpsborg FK, joined the collaboration of teams and ended a rather long and hefty rivalry between the two clubs  At the same time, in an effort to unite the different factions within the collaboration, the jersey was changed and the club renamed itself Sarpsborg Sparta FK  This name remained a source of contention throughout the 2008 season, however, and a new name, Sarpsborg 08 FF, was adopted in 2009 
The 2009 season started badly for Sarpsborg, and it appeared they would be fighting against relegation to the 2  divisjon  The situation worsened when the Football Association of Norway determined that Sarpsborg 08 had submitted an unrealistic budget when they obtained their license to play in the 1  divisjon, and were penalized three points in June, leaving Sarpsborg in a relegation spot  However, after Roar Johansen became coach, the second part of the season went well for the team, which not only climbed out of the relegation spots, but finished fifth, allowing them to participate in the qualification matches for the 2010 Tippeligaen  In the semi-final match of the qualification, Sarpsborg defeated local rivals Fredrikstad FK 2–0 (who were therefore relegated from the top division)  In the home match of the qualification final, Sarpsborg defeated Kongsvinger 3–2, but lost the second leg 3–1 and remained in the 1  divisjon 

Promotions and development
The 2010 season ended with a 4–0 home-win against Alta  This meant that the team ended in second place, after league-winner Sogndal, and won the right to play in the 2011 edition of the Tippeligaen 
The 2011 season started with a surprising 3–0 win against Molde in Ole Gunnar Solskjær first match as manager of Molde  But after a good start, Sarpsborg was relegated back to 1  divisjon on 23 October 2011, when they lost 3–0 away at Brann with three rounds left to play  The club finished last with only 21 points 
In the 2012 season, Sarpsborg finished the 1  divisjon in second place and was promoted to Tippeligaen  On 3 January 2013, former Sheffield United striker Brian Deane was appointed as head coach  In 2015, Geir Bakke took over as head coach and led the club to their first Norwegian Cup final  They lost the 2015 Norwegian Football Cup final 0−2 against Rosenborg  In 2017 they repeated the feat and reached the final again, but lost 2–3 against Lillestrøm  Sarpsborg finished in third place in the 2017 Eliteserien, their first medal-winning position in club history 
On 30 August 2018 Sarpsborg 08 qualified for the group stage of the 2018–19 UEFA Europa League for the first time in history 

African springboard
Sarpsborg 08 has gained a reputation as one of the best springboards for African players in need of a European acclimatization club  Senegalese Makthar Thioune played three years for Sparta Sarpsborg and Sarpsborg Sparta (Sarpsborg 08's predecessors) in the second tier, and when Molde purchased him in 2009 he was immediately "Player of the Year" in the top league, with the third highest rating in a 25-year period  He later played in Germany  Another big Sarpsborg 08 transfer in 2014 happened when Guangshou R&F manager Sven Göran Eriksson purchased Aaron Samuel from Sarpsborg 08 for €1 4m  Samuel blossomed in Sarpsborg with 13 goals in a year, after only 2 goals in big city club Vålerenga  He also scored both his goals for Nigeria in 2014  In 2017 Sarpsborg 08 signed Krepin Diatta from Senegal  He hardly played in his first half year in the club, but then blossomed with 5 goals and 8 assists in 3 months  Diatta was then sold to Brügge for €2 65m and later to Monaco for €16 7m  In 2019 Sarpsborg 08 signed Malian Ismaila Coulibaly and while acclimatized he only started 5 matches in the first 35 league matches while in the club  Then he was given the chance at a time the club was rock bottom with five losses in five matches  The club then took 17 points in the next 6 weeks and Coulibaly dominated with 4 goals, leading to Sheffield United purchasing him for €2m  Being only the 16th largest municipality in Norway, the processing of African teenage talents has been a major success factor leading to Sarpsborg 08 fighting above the size of the city 

Recent history
European record
Notes1QR: First qualifying round
2QR: Second qualifying round
3QR: Third qualifying round
PO: Play-off round

Players
Current squad
As of 5 May 2023Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules  Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality 

Out on loan
Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules  Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality 

Notable players
Below are notable players who have represented Sarpsborg 08  To appear in the section below, a player must have either at least two international matches or Champions League matches (group stage or later), 150 official club matches or 30 club goals, including appearances and goals for preceding teams mentioned in pre-existence phase  Players are sorted by birth date 

Managers
Passage 2:
2014 La Manga Cup
The 2014 La Manga Cup is an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe, which was held in February 2014  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga, Spain  This was the seventeenth La Manga Cup 

Teams
The following four clubs participated in the 2014 tournament:
 Aalesund
 Brann
 Sogndal
 Start

Standings
Matches
Winners
Passage 3:
2010 La Manga Cup
The 2010 La Manga Cup was an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe and North America, which was held in February 2010  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga Club, Spain  This was the thirteenth La Manga Cup  The tournament was won by Molde, who beat FC Nordsjælland 2–1 in the final 

Teams
The following eight clubs participated in the 2010 tournament:
 FC Midtjylland from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 FC Nordsjælland from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 SønderjyskE from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 Seattle Sounders FC from Major League Soccer in the United States of America
 Molde from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Rosenborg from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Brann from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Stabæk from Tippeligaen in Norway

Matches
The following games are part of the tournament 

Quarterfinals
Semifinals Places 5-8
Semifinals Places 1-4
Seventh Place Match
Fifth Place Match
Third Place Match
Final
Final Placement
Passage 4:
IK Start
Idrettsklubben Start (or simply IK Start, translates to The sports club Start  ) is a Norwegian football club from the city of Kristiansand that currently plays in the Norwegian First Division, the second tier of the Norwegian football league system  The club was founded on 19 September 1905  The club's current head coach is Sindre Tjelmeland  The team plays in yellow jerseys, black shorts and socks at home, and black jerseys, yellow shorts and socks away 
They play their home matches at Sør Arena, the club's own football stadium, opened in 2007  Before moving to Sør Arena, IK Start played their games at Kristiansand Stadion  The team's official supporter club was called "Tigerberget", until 2017, when the IK Start board decided to no longer have an official supporter club 

History
Start were Norwegian champions in 1978 and 1980  They participated in the European Cup in 1979 and 1981, as well as being qualified for the UEFA Champions League 2006–07  The years since 1995 have been turbulent, but recent investments have given greater expectations for the future  In 2004 they won the Norwegian 1  divisjon and were promoted to the top flight 
In 2005 they reached second place, following Vålerenga, after a strong comeback season in the Tippeligaen  For this, Start earned a place in the UEFA Cup 2006 
In 2006, after beating Skála of the Faroe Islands in the first qualifying round of the UEFA Cup, and Drogheda United of Ireland in the second qualifying round (after penalties), they reached the first round of the UEFA Cup, where they were knocked out by Ajax of the Netherlands 
2007 was a bad year for Start, with problems working as a team and management issues  It led to a disappointing 13th place, leading to Start's relegation to 1  divisjon  In 2008 the club got financial problems  The local government saved the club from bankruptcy  The financial difficulties has plagued Start for several seasons, due to the financial crisis and the Norwegian footballteams overspending, Start being no exception  The last couple of seasons, Start has downsized and saved money, for example by changing the turf on Sør Arena, the hopes being that the savings will keep the wheels turning in Start 
Ahead of the 2009 season, Knut Tørum was appointed head coach of Start  The next two seasons, Start was positioned at the lower half of Tippeligaen although achieving some strong results, like being the only team to beat Rosenborg in 2009, at Rosenborgs homeground Lerkendal, delaying their gold celebration  On 22 June 2011, Start had 13 points in 12 matches, and Tørum decided to resign hours before a cup-match against Strømsgodset, a match Start won without Tørum  Mons Ivar Mjelde replaced Tørum as head coach, but was not able to save Start from relegation  Start started the 2012 1  divisjon in strong fashion, leading the division and winning important matches and won promotion at the end of the season 
Start defeated Stabæk 4–1 on 4 July 2015  From 12 July 2015 to 18 September 2016, Start played 39 consecutive games without a win in Tippeligaen  This is the longest run without winning a single game across any top division in Europe 

Badge
Since the club was founded in 1905, the club badge had been a blue and white pennant  In November 2017, the badge was replaced with a more modernised version in all black  The new crest was in use for four years, before Start decided to return to the old one in March 2022 

Achievements
Eliteserien:
Winners (2): 1978, 1980
Runners-up (1): 2005
Third place (7): 1973, 1975, 1979, 1983, 1984, 1991, 1992
Norwegian Cup:
Semi finalist (7): 1975, 1978, 1988, 2000, 2006, 2011, 2018
1  divisjon:
Winners (4): 1968, 1972, 2004, 2012
Promotion: 1958–59, 1988, 1999, 2001, 2008, 2017

Recent history
Source:

Current squad
As of 12 April 2023Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules  Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality 

Coaching staff
Former head coaches
European record
Passage 5:
2013 La Manga Cup
The 2013 La Manga Cup was an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe, which was held in February 2013  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga Club, Spain  This was the sixteenth La Manga Cup 

Teams
The following eight clubs participated in the 2013 tournament:
 Aalesund
 Astra Giurgiu
 CSKA Moscow
 Kalmar
 Lillestrøm
 Nordsjælland
 Start
 Vålerenga

Standings
With only six teams entered, the 2012 version of the Cup was contested in a Round Robin style format, wherein each participating team played against three of the other seven teams entered in the competition, with the winner determined by points earned 

Matches
Winners
Passage 6:
La Manga Cup
La Manga Cup is a winter football tournament played in La Manga Club, La Manga del Mar Menor (Murcia, Spain)  Usual participants are clubs from countries with a summer football season: Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Russia, Ukraine, and the United States and Canada  The first cup was played in 1999 and was won by Rosenborg, who are the most successful team to date with three wins 

Winners
Performance
Performance by club
Performance by country
External links
History of tournament
Results (1999-2009)
Results (2010-2012)
La Manga Cup Standings 2000-2013
La Manga Cup Live Scores
Passage 7:
2015 La Manga Cup
The 2015 La Manga Cup is an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe, which was held in February and March 2015  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga Club, Spain  This was the eighteenth La Manga Cup 

Teams
The following 32 clubs participated in the 2015 tournament:

Standings
Group 1
Matches
Passage 8:
2012 La Manga Cup
The 2012 La Manga Cup was an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe, which was held in February 2012  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga, Spain  This was the fifteenth La Manga Cup  The tournament was won by FC Nordsjælland, who beat Vålerenga on goal differential after both clubs finished with identical records of two wins and one draw 

Teams
The following six clubs participated in the 2012 tournament:
 FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk from the Ukrainian Premier League in Ukraine
 FC Nordsjælland from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 FK Ekranas from the A Lyga in Lithuania
 Strømsgodset from the Tippeligaen in Norway
 Vålerenga from the Tippeligaen in Norway
 Viking from the Tippeligaen in Norway

Standings
With only six teams entered, the 2012 version of the Cup was contested in a Round Robin style format, wherein each participating team played against three of the other five teams entered in the competition, with the winner determined by points earned 

Matches
Passage 9:
2001 Norwegian Football Cup Final
The 2001 Norwegian Football Cup final was the final match of the 2001 Norwegian Football Cup, the 96th season of the Norwegian Football Cup, the premier Norwegian football cup competition organized by the Football Association of Norway (NFF)  The match was played on 4 November 2001 at the Ullevaal Stadion in Oslo, and opposed two Tippeligaen sides Bryne and Viking  Viking defeated Bryne 3–0 to claim the Norwegian Cup for a fifth time in their history  Despite the victory, the Viking's players reported for training at 2 p m  the next day 

Route to the final
Match
Details
Passage 10:
2011 La Manga Cup
The 2011 La Manga Cup was an exhibition international club football (soccer) competition featuring football club teams from Europe, which was held in February 2011  All matches were played in La Manga Stadium in La Manga, Spain  This was the fourteenth La Manga Cup  The tournament was won by Viking, who beat Start on goal differential after both clubs finished with identical records of two wins and one draw 

Teams
The following 8 clubs participated in the 2011 tournament:

 FC Midtjylland from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 Esbjerg fB from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 Randers FC from the Danish Superliga in Denmark
 Kalmar FF from the Allsvenskan in Sweden
 Strømsgodset from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Viking from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Odd Grenland from Tippeligaen in Norway
 Start from Tippeligaen in Norway

Standings
With eight teams entered, the 2011 version of the Cup was contested in a Round Robin style format, wherein each participating team played against three of the other seven teams entered in the competition, with the winner determined by points earned 

Matches
Context 2: Passage 1:
Eugene Porter
Eugene Porter (full name in the television series:  Eugene Hermann Porter) is a fictional character from the comic book series The Walking Dead and is portrayed by Josh McDermitt beginning in the fourth season of the American television series of the same name  In both media he claims to be a scientist who knows the cure to the zombie plague and is being escorted to Washington, D C  by Sgt  Abraham Ford and Rosita Espinosa, and encounter Rick Grimes and his group and recruit them to assist their mission 
Eugene possesses virtually no survival skills of his own and is extremely dependent on the group, but is highly intelligent and resourceful in using technology to ensure the group's survival  Eventually, it is revealed that Eugene is not a scientist, but a high school science teacher, and that he does not know how to cure the virus but lied to manipulate the other survivors into taking him to Washington, D C  believing it to be the best chance for survival  This proves true as the group eventually finds the Alexandria Safe-Zone where Eugene becomes its primary engineer  Though his lie puts a strain on their friendship, Abraham eventually forgives him and they resume being friends 

Appearances
Comic book series
Eugene first appears at Hershel's farm, which is now occupied by the remaining prison survivors  Eugene claims to know what has caused the plague, but will not disclose any information with the remaining survivors, including Abraham and Rosita  He says he will only share information with officials in Washington, D C  His lie, along with a belief that Washington is the only safezone, prompts the rest of the survivors to head there in hopes of long-term survival During the journey, Eugene studies various zombies in order to gain knowledge about them, but is careful to shadow the convoy to protect himself Eugene's deception is discovered after the Hunter ordeal  Everyone learns of his true career as a science teacher, and that he is using the radio as an excuse to get to Washington, D C  He is hated by the group after this but remains a member, travelling with them to the Alexandria Safe-Zone, where he lives alone  After Rosita and Abraham break up, she moves in with Eugene, where he tries to create a relationship between them  Eugene eventually realizes he can begin to manufacture bullets in a repair shop nearby, where Abraham is killed when they scout it out only moments after they make amends  During the war with Negan, the shop is overrun by walkers and Eugene with his crew are captured by Negan  They are tortured for information but eventually escape with the help of Dwight, taking a van with a mix of Alexandrians and defecting Saviours back After the two-year time jump, Eugene and Rosita have a strained relationship  He works on many projects in the zone and is now a respected member of the community  It turns out Rosita is pregnant by another man but Eugene vows to raise the child like his own 

Television series
Season 4
Eugene, Abraham and Rosita are introduced to Tara and Glenn in the episode "Inmates"  Eugene claims to be a scientist with vital information to end the pandemic and needs to get to Washington D C , having secured Abraham and Rosita's escort ("Claimed")  Tara and Glenn join them, and soon their group is reunited with Maggie, Sasha, and Bob ("Us")  Eugene convinces Abraham that they should join with this group as they make their way to Terminus for supplies and more recruits  However, the group becomes captives of the residents of Terminus when they arrive ("A") 

Season 5
Rick Grimes helps to save Eugene and the other captured group from Terminus ("No Sanctuary") and continue to make their way north, taking shelter in the former church run by Father Gabriel ("Strangers")  After a day, Abraham believes they must continue on, but Rick wants to wait for Daryl and Carol who had gone looking for Beth  Abraham's group is joined by Tara, Glenn, and Maggie as they take one of the church buses to drive north  ("Four Walls and a Roof")  During a stop, Eugene purposely sabotages the bus, admitting he fears being abandoned if he does not succeed in abolishing the epidemic  Abraham finds a fire truck that allows them to continue, until they run into a section of road that is overwhelmed by hundreds of walkers  blocking their path  As the others try to figure out if they can go around, Eugene admits that he lied about being a scientist, having only used it to coerce Abraham into protecting him  Enraged, Abraham punches him, knocking Eugene out ("Self Help")  Once he recovers, the group decides to return to rejoin Rick's group, who had failed to save Beth after she had been kidnapped to Atlanta ("Crossed") 
Some time later, the group is invited to join the Alexandria Safe Zone community, a suburban development protected by strong walls  Eugene helps with maintenance of the community, and goes with Glenn, Noah, Tara, Aiden, and Nicholas to get electronics supplies from a nearby warehouse  The inexperienced Alexandrians Aiden and Nicholas create more problems, leading Tara to be injured  While Glenn and Noah attempt to cover for them, Eugene helps to rescue Tara to their van, and fights off Nicholas who wants to try to ditch the others and flee back to Alexandria with the van  Glenn arrives to stop Nicholas in time ("Spend")  Back in Alexandria, while watching over Tara as she heals, Eugene and Abraham apologize to each other, and Eugene thanks Abraham for getting them to Alexandria ("Conquer") 

Season 6
In the season premiere, "First Time Again", Eugene is in the food pantry gathering food for himself when he overhears one Alexandrian, Carter, trying to convince Deanna's son Spencer, Tobin, Francine, and Olivia to help kill Rick and take back Alexandria from Rick as he believes they are becoming dangerous and power-hungry  Eugene drops a glass jar which alerts Carter of his presence  Carter approaches Eugene and says that he heard the plan before aiming his gun at Eugene  Eugene states that he didn't hear anything  He is almost killed by Carter, but is saved as Rick, Michonne, and newcomer Morgan Jones walk in on them and disarm Carter  In "JSS", Eugene meets Dr  Denise Cloyd, who is the new doctor after Pete's death  In "Heads Up", Eugene is seen attending Rosita's lesson on how to use a machete, but seems very distracted by the noise of the walkers outside  He admits that he's scared of dying; Rosita tells him that dying is easy and that watching friends die is much harder to bear  In the mid-season finale, "Start to Finish", Eugene is rescued by Tara and Rosita from the herd of walkers, seconds after hearing Daryl on the radio and letting out a cry of help  The three seek refuge and get trapped in a nearby garage  Later, Eugene uses his lock-picking skills to escape the room  They stumble into the same room where Owen is holding Denise captive, with Carol and Morgan unconscious on the floor  He forces them to surrender their weapons and Eugene watches as the Wolf leaves the house, taking Denise with him  In the mid-season premiere "No Way Out", Eugene helps kill the remaining herd, showing his growing acts of bravery 
In the episode "Twice as Far", Eugene now goes on patrols with Abraham  He calls himself a survivor now  Eugene is furious after Abraham does not allow him to kill a walker and tells Abraham he no longer needs his protection and has outlived his usefulness to him  Abraham leaves and tells Eugene to find his own way home  After Denise is killed by Dwight, it is revealed that he and his men have captured Eugene  Dwight demands that he, Daryl and Rosita take them back to Alexandria and if they do not oblige, he will kill them  Eugene spots Abraham hiding behind oil barrels nearby and insists that they should kill him first  Dwight orders one of his men to investigate, and while he is distracted Eugene turns and bites his crotch  Abraham uses the distraction to shoot two Saviors, and Daryl and Rosita are able to retrieve their guns  Dwight manages to break free from Eugene, who is hit during the shootout  As Dwight and the remaining Saviors flee, Abraham, Rosita and Daryl carry Eugene back to Alexandria  Abraham reconciles with Eugene at home  In the season finale "Last Day on Earth", Eugene accompanies a small group to bring an ill Maggie to the Hilltop  The Saviors trap the group and Negan kills one of them after a twisted variation of the game, Eeny, meeny, miny, moe 

Season 7
Eugene and the others are forced to witness Negan kill Abraham and later Glenn before they are let go, but told to expect the Saviors to arrive at Alexandria for a portion of their supplies ("The Day Will Come When You Won't Be")  After Rosita berates Eugene for being a coward, Eugene discovers a nearby metalworking shop and constructs a single bullet, which he gives to her ("Sing Me a Song")  Negan and the Saviors arrive and start taking supplies, including ammunition  An altercation between Negan and Spencer leads to Negan killing him; in anger, Rosita fires Eugene's bullet at Negan, but only striking his bat  Negan prepares to have the Saviors kill Rosita, but Eugene steps forward and claims responsibility for making the bullet  Seeing the potential for his skills, Negan takes Eugene with the Saviors when they depart ("Hearts Still Beating")  At the Saviors' Sanctuary, Eugene claims he is a scientist and provides advice about dealing with walkers to Negan  Negan takes a liking to Eugene for this, as well as Eugene's willingness to submit to him, and makes him one of his lieutenants, giving him additional comforts and benefits ("Hostiles and Calamities")  Sasha and Rosita secretly arrive to try to kill Negan and rescue Eugene, but Eugene refuses to leave, and as a result, Sasha is captured ("Something They Need")  Eugene visits Sasha in captivity to try to convince her to join Negan, but Sasha flatly refuses, and insists instead Eugene bring her a weapon to use against Negan  He comes back later and secretly slips her a poison capsule ("Something They Need")  Knowing that Negan plans to bring Sasha to Alexandria in a coffin in order to kill her in front of Rick's group as payback for the death of one of his men, Eugene finds a music player to give to Sasha during transit  At Alexandria, when Negan goes to open the cabinet, a reanimated Sasha attacks him; Eugene realizes that Sasha had used the poison pill to commit suicide so she could attack Negan  The surprise causes chaos that eventually allows the Alexandrians with the other communities to ward off the Saviors' attack, and Negan, Eugene, and the other Saviors retreat  Back at Sanctuary, Eugene claims to have no idea how Sasha died in transit ("The First Day of the Rest of Your Lives") 

Season 8
Eugene appears as one of Negan's lieutenants in "Mercy," but is essentially ignored by Rick beyond a brief acknowledgment when Rick tries to negotiate with the lieutenants  Along with the rest of the Saviors, he is trapped in the Sanctuary by the herd the Militia lures there 
In "The Big Scary U," Eugene acts as part of the council trying to decide how to deal with the siege  Eugene disagrees with Simon's amoral plans for escape, backed up by Dwight  As a result, Eugene thanks Dwight for his help privately  Eugene later realizes that Dwight is the traitor in the Sanctuary helping Rick's group  After Gabriel is brought in as a prisoner, Eugene attempts to bring him food and discovers that Gabriel is deathly ill  Gabriel asks for Eugene's help in rescuing Doctor Harlan Carson from the Sanctuary so that Doctor Carson can aid Maggie in her pregnancy  In "Time for After," Eugene confronts Dwight about his betrayal  Though Dwight admits to it, he insists that all Eugene needs to do is let things play out as Rick only wishes Negan dead and is trying to force everyone else to surrender  Eugene is shown to have conflicted loyalties, drinking heavily and contemplating the seriously ill Gabriel's request to help rescue Doctor Carson  Eugene eventually comes up with a plan to lure the walkers away using the music player he gave Sasha, but is foiled by Dwight  Shortly afterwards, Daryl and Tara crash a garbage truck into the Sanctuary flooding it with walkers  Eugene refuses to help Gabriel, stating that he is now out only for himself  Eugene presents a plan to defeat the herd to Negan, but stops short of exposing Dwight's treachery 
In the mid-season finale "How It's Gotta Be," it is revealed that Eugene has found a way to clear the Sanctuary of walkers, allowing the Saviors to retaliate against Alexandria, the Hilltop and the Kingdom  Eugene continues to struggle with his conscience, drinking heavily to numb the guilt  Finally, Eugene decides to help Gabriel and Dr  Carson escape despite the likelihood that it will result in Gabriel's death due to his condition  Eugene discreetly disables one of the gate guards and leaves a vehicle for Gabriel and Carson to use that he "accidentally" drops the keys to before leaving the two  Though Gabriel requests that Eugene return with them, Eugene refuses 
In the mid-season premiere "Honor" in Carl's envisioned future, Eugene is tending the gardens in Alexandria and offers Judith a green apple  In "Dead or Alive Or", Eugene is questioned by Negan, who is unaware that Eugene helped two of his captives escape  A nervous Eugene inquires about the events that occurred at Alexandria, Negan questions his loyalty and sending him to his own outpost in a bullet factory to create ammunition for war 

Season 9
Season 10
Following the crash of a satellite, Eugene builds a long-range radio and begins communicating with a woman calling herself Stephanie, eventually falling in love with her and setting up a rendezvous  Following the destruction of the Hilltop, Eugene leads Ezekiel, Yumiko and Princess to meet with Stephanie  However, upon arriving at the meeting location after some mishaps, the group is captured and interrogated by the Commonwealth Army 

Season 11
After being allowed into the Commonwealth, Eugene begins a romantic relationship with the woman introducing herself as Stephanie, but finds himself caught up the machinations of the Commonwealth's Governor, Pamela Milton, and her right-hand man, Lance Hornsby  Eugene is eventually forced to lead the Commonwealth Army to Alexandria after an altercation with Milton's son Sebastian, arriving just in time to deliver vital food and rebuilding supplies for the community  After Alexandria joins up with the Commonwealth, Eugene permanently moves to the Commonwealth, becomes a schoolteacher, and writes a manuscript about Stephanie 
One day, Stephanie suddenly vanishes and Eugene begins an investigation, eventually discovering a rogue element within the Commonwealth led by Hornsby, who seeks power for himself  "Stephanie" turns out to be one of Hornsby's spies, Shira, who was assigned to seduce Eugene in order to find his community so as to further Hornsby's plans  Hornsby manipulates and shames Eugene into keeping quiet about his discoveries and Eugene burns his manuscript  However, shortly thereafter, Eugene finally meets the real Stephanie who turns out to be Milton's assistant Max Mercer  Max explains that her communications with Eugene had gotten intercepted, although her brother, General Michael Mercer, had kept Max from being discovered, resulting in her being unable to meet Eugene as promised  After some initial hesitation on both sides, Eugene and Max start a romantic relationship and become embroiled in the plan to sow dissent against Pamela 
As the communities prepare to go their separate ways, Eugene agrees to help Max expose the Miltons by conspiring to publicly play a recording that Max had made of Sebastian mocking the people of the Commonwealth  However, this stunt coincides with an attack by several reanimated Commonwealth janitors, murdered by Hornsby's forces, attacks a public festival  An enraged Sebastian tries to feed Max to a walker, but Eugene throws the walker off of her  However, the walker lands on Sebastian and kills him before Judith puts it down  As a result, Eugene becomes a wanted fugitive, hunted for the murder of Sebastian  Eugene eventually turns himself in and confesses, but lies that he had acted alone so as to protect Max 
Eugene is put on trial for Sebastian's murder, although Milton rigs the trial against him, while arresting his friends disappear and blackmailing Yumiko into prosecuting him  Although resigned to his fate, Eugene urges Yumiko not to lose faith in their friends or herself, and she decides to act as Eugene's defense attorney  Eugene and Yumiko use the trial to further expose Milton's corruption and reach out to the lower classes  At the end of the trial, Eugene makes a speech admitting to his faults, and urging the people to stand up to Milton  Although Eugene is sentenced to die, he is broken out by General Mercer and some of his troops, who are rebelling against Milton 
As a horde overruns the Commonwealth, Eugene reunites with his friends and helps Rosita to rescue her daughter  However, he is devastated to find that she has been bitten  Eugene helps to overthrow Milton and to destroy the horde  In the aftermath, Eugene confesses his love for Rosita and is at her bedside as she dies 
A year later, Eugene continues to reside in the Commonwealth which is now led by Ezekiel  During this time, Eugene has married Max and they have had a daughter named Rosie together 

Casting
The Eugene character was announced in a casting call for Episode 10 in July 2013, under code-name "Wayne Kasey"  The character's real name and the actor who would play the role (McDermitt) were confirmed during the show's panel at New York Comic Con 2013  The Hollywood Reporter and other media publicized the confirmation afterwards 

Critical reception
Writing for IGN, Dan Phillips praised Eugene's introduction in Issue #53 Noel Murray of Rolling Stone ranked Eugene Porter 12th in a list of 30 best Walking Dead characters, saying, "Since admitting that he can't cure zombie-ism, the former high school science teacher has become determined to earn others' loyalty for real, and his tentative steps toward confidence and courage have been inspiring to watch  Plus any actor who can rock a mullet like Josh McDermitt is a-ok in our book "
Passage 2:
Survive This
Survive This is a Canadian reality television show in which eight teenagers with limited survival skills training are taken into a forest and confronted with a number of survival challenges to test their skills and perseverance  The series aired on YTV in Canada and Cartoon Network in the United States  The show is hosted by Les Stroud, who narrates each episode, provides the teens with survival challenges, and assesses their performance  The show premiered on April 7, 2009, in Canada and on June 17, 2009, in the United States  Cartoon Network ceased to air Survive This after August 19, 2009, and screened the final three episodes only on the network's website 
The series' second season debuted on April 19, 2010 and ended on July 12, 2010 

Overview
The series began in 2009 with a single season of 13 episodes  A second season of 13 episodes began airing in April 2010  Each season begins with a fictional accident of some sort (a school bus crash in season one; a floatplane crash in season two) as a narrative hook and to introduce the participants to their first survival challenges 
Les Stroud, star and host of the television program Survivorman, introduces each episode and provides narrative commentary for the events depicted during the episode  Stroud also appears on camera at the beginning of each episode to meet with the participants, discuss their health and emotional status, and present them with the day's survival challenge  Stroud then departs  Stroud sometimes appears at halfway points in each episode to check on their status  Each challenge concludes with Stroud visiting the participants again, re-assessing their physical and emotional state, and asking whether anyone wishes to leave the show and go home The second season differed from the first as in the final episode, Les Stroud named one of the final participants, Colin as the "Ultimate Survivor"  The question Stroud asked to the participants if they wanted to leave was also changed from "Who wants out?" to "Who can survive?" 

Production
Series production
Series creator Les Stroud says that he initially pitched Survive This, as a children's series similar to Survivorman and that several networks turned him down  The success of Survivorman enabled Stroud to pitch his original idea again, and this time the series was greenlighted in 2007 by 9 Story Entertainment, a Canadian entertainment company  Survive This is produced by 9 Story Entertainment, and two 9 Story executives (Vince Commisso and Steven Jarosz) serve as executive producers for the series  Les Stroud and his Survivorman production partner, David Brady, are also executive producers  Craig Baines is the producer The series was originally titled Survivorman: Kids Edition  The original concept was to create two teams of teens (age 13 to 17) and pit them against one another, testing their survivalist skills  This concept soon changed, however  In April 2008, 9 Story announced that the show (now called Survivorman Kids) would feature a single team of six 14- to 16-year-olds surviving in the wilderness for three weeks  The number of participants expanded to eight by the time filming began in summer 2008  In its final form, unlike other reality television shows, Survive This intentionally did not have a cash prize or other reward at the end of the season  Instead, the producers decided that contestants would leave the series with the knowledge that they survived a number of physically and mentally daunting challenges  Stroud refused to allow participants to vote their peers off the show or to win "immunity", arguing that this would change the focus of the series toward "backstabbing social networking" and away from survival skills and the wilderness experience Cast members were recruited in a variety of ways: Online, via forms at summer camps, and by several other means  After each person's application was screened by the producers, participants had to pass a telephone interview and a video interview before they were chosen for the show  Stroud was not involved in the actual selection process, but did provide some guidelines for the production company before the process began 
All I suggested within that process was get a good, wide selection of kids  Let’s get a wide selection of personalities and temperaments and certainly skill level  Don’t give me a whole bunch of boy scouts who are going to knock it dead out there and don’t give me a whole bunch of absolute beginners who are set up for failure  Give me a wide variety, let’s have regular, normal kids and don’t profile beyond that Once selected for the show, a camera crew filmed each teenager at home to get footage of them acting naturally in their home surroundings  The eight teenagers were taught for a week how to survive in a wilderness with limited supplies  They were also constantly filmed during this time, to acclimate them to the ever-present cameras and filmmakers 

Season One production
Eight teenagers, all between the ages of 14 and 17, were taken into a forest in Ontario, Canada, and initially asked to "survive" a school bus crash and spend two nights in the woods with limited food and other supplies The series was filmed on location in the forest north of Huntsville, Ontario, Canada  Filming occurred in the summer of 2008  Three days were spent on a small island northwest of Sandy Island on Georgian Bay in Lake Huron  Jeff Beitz, owner of the Georgian Bay Marina, acted as a location scout for the show, transported the participants to and from the island, and appeared on screen in Episode 11, "Island Castaways " Many of the challenges presented to the participants were based on situations Stroud himself faced on Survivorman A camera crew remained behind to film the participants as they carried out their survival challenges, some of which lasted several days  However, the camera crew was instructed not to interact with the participants  Several participants were also given hand-held video cameras and permitted to film their actions  A paramedic also was always on-site to provide emergency health care  Participants were forbidden to have any electronic devices with them, and could only speak to the producer or Stroud (who were both on-site)   Stroud says that the participants constantly played to the camera, positioned themselves at the right camera angle to achieve the best pose, and—even though they were forbidden to do so—talked to the cinematographers to try to put themselves in a good light  Several of the participants were upset at the way their videotaped comments appeared on television  Some also expressed shock and surprise at the things others said about them in privately videotaped moments which later aired during the series  For his part, Stroud purposefully adopted a serious demeanor that involved never smiling in front of the participants  He later told TV Guide Canada that not providing suggestions, encouragement, or other assistance was difficult for him The participants were given little in the way of supplies   They had no camp stoves or sleeping bags, and at times water was so scarce that they squeezed liquid from moss A one-hour Season One finale featured a search and rescue (SAR) operation to locate and extract the remaining participants  The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and the Georgian Bay Volunteer Search and Rescue (GBVSAR) participated in the filming of the final episode, which involved a GBVSAR search team and the OPP's K9, marine, and air units  Filming of the finale took a single day The final scenes were shot at the end of the summer of 2008  Some footage and a trailer for the show were shown at MIPCOM, a market and trade event in the entertainment industry held in Cannes, France  The first two completed episodes screened to buyers and markets at the MIPTV Media Market in March 2009  Corus Entertainment's YTV picked up the show for broadcast in Canada in April 2008  Time Warner's Cartoon Network agreed to air the show in the U S  in March 2009  The first season ended with a one-hour finale  9 Story Entertainment sold distribution rights to Cartoon Network's Boomerang Channel Latin America, YLE in Finland, and Teleview International in the Middle East in April 2009 Producer 9 Story Entertainment began to license the show in May 2009, seeking to put the Survive This logo and images from the show on board games, books, video games, role-playing games, and clothing 

Season Two production
Second season casting opened on June 5, 2009, and closed on July 10, 2009  Applicants were invited to a television production studio in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, where they met with the producers and had a screen test to determine how they came across on television  Participants were selected for the show, in part, based on their strong personalities  The final eight participants were told in early September 2009 that they were selected for the show  The eight teens who appear in the second season were required to sign a confidentiality agreement prior to the commencement of filming  All the participants were required to take a three-day survival program with David Arama, a wilderness survival expert and close friend of Les Stroud's  Training including how to build a shelter, fire-starting, edible plants, and using a compass Principal cinematography for the second season occurred in September 2009 (which meant some of the contestants missed the opening of school in order to finish the show)  Most of the second season was filmed around the Georgian Bay area of Lake Huron and Algonquin Provincial Park  None of the teens knew the location of the series, but were aware that they were not close to any cities or towns  The teens were always watched by an adult and were provided warm clothes at night  Initially, many of the contestants did not take the show or host Les Stroud seriously  According to contestant Patricia Robins, "We were calling him Les Stroodle     at first we all thought he was kind of a jerk, just because of his attitude  [But] toward the end we kind of adopted him as a father figure  He's really protective  We found that out later on "As in the first series, the teenaged contestants are introduced into the wilderness via an accident—in the second season, it is a floatplane crash  Two contestants were separated from the rest of the group and forced to spend a night alone  As in the previous season, the search for food is a major element of the show  In the first season, teenager Adam Deganis killed a pheasant (in the episode "Food") and a porcupine (in the episode "Deep Woods, Part I")   In the third episode of the second season, the participants decapitate and kill a snake for food  The show's format remains much the same, with a different challenge in each episode and Stroud asking the teens if they can survive at the end of each installment  An article about one of the contestants states that only one of the teens "survives" until the final episode, however this is incorrect  The actual number is determined by who drops out, and is mentioned on the official website's 'Synopsis page' 
The second season of Survive This consists of 13 episodes, with a one-hour finale  The second season debuted on the YTV cable TV channel on Monday, April 19, 2010 

Participants
Season One
In the first season, eight teenagers were given a week's survival training before being taken into the wilderness  The Season One cast included:

Adam—Adam Deganis is a 15-year-old native of Mississauga, Ontario, who attends Loyola Catholic Secondary School  Labeled as "the sportsman" on the series, his survival experiences consisted of hunting, fishing, and spending summers at his family vacation home  A fan of Survivorman, he applied to be on the series because he wanted to meet Les Stroud  Deganis is an arachnophobe 
Becca—Becca Mehaffey is a 16-year-old from Markham, Ontario, who has almost no outdoors experience  Her friends and family laughed at her when she applied to be on the show  She was called "the princess" on the show, and practices dance in her spare time 
Becky—Becky Tran is a 17-year-old  from Newmarket, Ontario, who was labeled "the environmentalist" on the series, but whom the other participants called "BT " Tran, who is admittedly "addicted" to her hair iron, was frightened of dirt, germs, and insects 
Catarina—Catarina is a 17-year-old who was described as "the tough girl" on the series 
Holden—Holden Adams is a 16-year-old who was called "the city boy" on the show  After the show ended, he admitted that lack of sleep, hunger, and physical exhaustion often led him to rest while others did the work of finding food and building shelter  Adams died in February 2015 
Jen—Jennifer Daub is a 16-year-old resident of Blind River, Ontario  She attends W  C  Eaket Secondary School  She was labeled "the hunter" on the series because she had spent time tracking and hunting deer with her father, and was an expert rifleman, all-terrain vehicle driver, and camper  One of her older brothers learned about the show and encouraged her to apply  She applied online by sending in a photo of herself with a deer she had shot and killed  She was often frustrated on the show by having to help other participants who had little outdoors experience 
Kareem—Kareem Ali is a 17-year-old native of Toronto, Ontario, Canada  Given the label of "the motivator" by the producers, he was seen as more competitive than the others  He attends Bloor Collegiate Institute 
Zac—Zac Siegel is a 14-year-old resident of Thornhill, Ontario, who attends Westmount Collegiate Institute  He applied to be on the show through a survival camp he was already enrolled at  He had extensive wilderness survival skills before he joined the show, has a photographic memory, and a high-level intelligence  He was extremely frustrated on the show because the other participants had so little wilderness survival skill  "In many cases I had to teach people to start a fire or build a proper shelter, collect berries, basically I spent a lot of time with those who didn't have a clue what Les was talking about," he told the press  Labeled as "the camp counselor" by the producers, the other participants saw him as an overachiever 

Season Two
In the first season, eight teenagers were given a week's survival training before being taken into the wilderness  The Season Two cast included:

Colin—Colin is a 15-year-old from Hamilton, Ontario  He believes that a balance between a social life and school is important  He was labelled "The Whiz Kid" 
Ian—Ian McBain is a 14-year-old from Ajax, Ontario  Interested in animals and the outdoors and seeking a career as a biologist, McBain was inspired to audition for the second season after seeing the first-season episode Swamp: "The episode from the first season that really motivated me to try to get on the show was the swamp episode  "Most people would think 'Oh gross  a swamp, there's leeches and stuff ' That was the turning point for me, I was like 'I have to get on this show, that looks so fun, so many different experiences ' He was dubbed "The Book Worm" McBain, who admits to being an unadventurous "wimp", says that he learned to trust other people and believe in himself during the show  For him, the toughest part of the series was getting through the nights and worrying about wild animal attacks 
Jade—Jade is a 13-year-old girl from Ancaster, Ontario  She was raised on a farm and was labelled "The Country Girl" 
Justin—Justin Cutajar is a 16-year-old from Mississauga, Ontario labelled "the Rock Star"  He had auditioned for the first season but did not make the cut  He auditioned for the second season because he still wanted to see how far he could push himself  He says being on the show was "a life-altering experience " The hardest part, for him, was the lack of food; he lost 12 pounds (5 4 kg) while filming the series  Back at home after the show, he says he never leaves food on his plate and reminds himself every day of how he has a bed to sleep in and home to live in  he cites patience, emotional strength, the will to live, and physical strength as the things which allowed him to get through the show 
Manaal—Manaal Ismacil is a 16-year-old from St  Catharines, Ontario labeled "The Diplomat"  Her mother is a Somalian who is a refugee from Somalia  Manaal was born in Kenya, but her family emigrated to the United States when she was seven years old and to Canada four years later  She attends Sir Winston Churchill Secondary School, loves to read and study, and has never been camping  She had not seen the first season, but applied after being urged to do so by her younger sister (who had)  She is interested in International relations, and wants a career as a human rights lawyer  She is a volunteer in many groups, including her school, the St  Catharines mayor's council, and Save the Children Canada 
Michael—Michael Lattouf is a 17-year-old from Brampton, Ontario, who attends Notre Dame Catholic Secondary School and wants to be an actor, earning him the label "The Entertainer"  He had no survival skills prior to appearing on the show  He says that he felt overwhelmed at first  The producers and Les Stroud "just threw us right in, and it was non-stop," and he felt the lack of food was the most challenging aspect of the show  He also felt that having eight teenagers on the show made for a lot of emotion  Lattouf says the show was very challenging, and he learned a great deal from it  "People live like this every day—homeless people, or people in poor countries—and it made me understand their struggles more "
Nicole—Nicole Ponce is a 14-year-old girl who is heavily involved in school athletics, giving her the label "the Athlete"  She resides in Etobicoke, Ontario and is a freshman at Michael Power/St  Joseph High School  At a young age, she was often bullied before organized sports made its way into her life  She plays competitively and with a positive attitude in a number of sports including soccer, basketball and volleyball  She hopes to someday become a pediatrician and aspires to help children in need  With her charming personality and newly found confidence, she is ready to take on every challenge the wilderness and life has to offer 
Patricia—Patricia (Trish) Robins is a 16-year-old from Niagara Falls, Ontario  She attends Stamford Collegiate Secondary School  She applied to be on the show without having seen the first season  She believed that only actors were admitted to the show, and felt that this would be a boost to her acting career  After seeing the first season, she resolved to turn down the show if offered a chance to compete and then later changes her mind  Labeled as "The Rebel" on the show, she says she is more of a diva 

Critical reception
Season One critical reception
At least one psychologist warned that Survive This risked being exploitative and might damage the mental health of the participants  "You're putting kids into real emotional situations for other people's enjoyment," said Jennifer Kolari, a child and family therapist and author  "It's okay to have some competition, it's okay to try out for things," she says  "Those are okay lessons for kids  But doing it on national television, to be watched and judged, that's where I feel it's a little bit exploitive, and I think we need to consider the mental health of the kids that are on that show " But other mental health experts declared the show safe, concluding that the participants merely displayed strong competitiveness and that social ostracization was largely avoided Several reviewers have strongly criticized Survive This  For example, the New Bedford Standard-Times was dismissive of the show's lack of originality, noting: "   a gruff, gritty, macho mountain man takes a group of high-school kids and dumps them in the deep woods where they must learn to put aside their 'drama' and adapt  Gee, where haven't we seen that before?"  Variety was equally critical of the show's lack of originality, observing that the show "play[ed] like junior editions of somebody else's reality franchise  The publication was also critical of the way the show pigeonholed and labeled each of the teenagers, eliminating the diversity of the racially and ethnically diverse cast  The Los Angeles Times also concluded that the show was vapid, but that it had slightly more "depth" than other Cartoon Network live-action programs Some critics have also blasted Cartoon Network for showing live-action programs rather than cartoons However, the Sudbury Star called the show "compelling" 

Season One ratings
Television ratings information on the show is difficult to come by   However, at least one newspaper said the show was not "catching on with viewers" on Cartoon Network, and that the show had never been among that network's top 10 series 

Season Two critical reception
In March 2010, Toronto resident Richard Code, a fan of Stroud's show Survivorman, was found dead from hypothermia near his campsite at the north end of Horn Lake (near McMurrich/Monteith, Ontario)  Code was on a winter camping trip with few supplies, similar to summer trips he'd taken before in admiration of the adventures he had seen on Survivorman  Learning of Code's death, Stroud said, "It's a terrible tragedy and I feel absolutely terrible for the families involved"—but did not know Code or the situation he was in, and refused to comment further on his death At least one reviewer has criticized Survive This for not mentioning Code's death or warning kids not to imitate what they see on the show  The Globe and Mail reviewer Catherine Dawson March wrote, "You'd think, just seven weeks after Code's headline-making death, that Survive This would make a passing nod to the tragedy      Some kind of 'don't try this on your own' advice  But no " Dawson praised the show as "captivating" with "lots of emotional drama", but concluded:  "It's great stuff, but YTV should acknowledge Code's death with a warning of their own " YTV replied, "As Survive This does not follow the same premise as Survivorman, there will not be a disclaimer before each episode "

See also
Survive This (Season One)
Survive This (Season Two)
Passage 3:
Cody Lundin
Cody Lundin  (born March 15, 1967) is a survival instructor at the Aboriginal Living Skills School in Prescott, Arizona, which he founded in 1991  There he teaches modern wilderness survival skills, primitive living skills, urban preparedness, and homesteading  Lundin was also a former co-host of Discovery Channel's reality television series, Dual Survival Lundin is an only child whose father was in the military  He spent his early childhood moving around until finally settling in Laramie, Wyoming, where he attended junior high and high school  After graduating from high school he lived on the streets, in a commune, in the backyards of friends, and then in a brush shelter while he attended college in Prescott, Arizona  Lundin holds a B A  in Depth Psychology and Holistic Health from Prescott College Lundin is the author of two books on survival and preparedness: 98 6 Degrees: The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive and When All Hell Breaks Loose: Stuff You Need to Survive When Disaster Strikes  Lundin has also provided a foreword for Steve Hart's Citizen Survivor's Handbook, a parody of British wartime propaganda focusing on the importance of psychological endurance in times of crisis 
In 2004, Lundin hosted the Discovery Channel show, Lost in the Wild Lundin was a co-host of the television series Dual Survival from 2010 until 2014  On the show, Lundin demonstrated various survival skills while wearing shorts in all weather and going barefoot  On February 17, 2014 Lundin announced on his Facebook page and on his website that he had been fired from the series due to differences of opinion on matters of safety  Lundin says that he lives off-the-grid in a self-designed, passive solar earth home in the high-desert wilderness of northern Arizona, collecting rainwater, composting waste, and paying nothing for utilities 

Bibliography
Lundin, Cody (2003)  98 6 Degrees: The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive  Gibbs Smith  ISBN 1586852345 
Lundin, Cody (2007)  When All Hell Breaks Loose: Stuff You Need To Survive When Disaster Strikes  Gibbs Smith  ISBN 978-1423601050 

See also
Dave Canterbury
Passage 4:
Les Stroud
Les Stroud (born October 20, 1961) is a Canadian survival expert, filmmaker and musician best known as the creator, writer, producer, director, cameraman and host of the television series Survivorman   Stroud was named Chief Scout by Scouts Canada on November 22, 2021   After a short career behind the scenes in the music industry, Stroud became a full-time wilderness guide, survival instructor and musician based in Huntsville, Ontario  Stroud has produced survival-themed programming for The Outdoor Life Network, The Discovery Channel, The Science Channel, and YTV   The survival skills imparted from watching Stroud's television programs have been cited by several people as the reason they lived through harrowing wilderness ordeals 

Biography
Stroud was born in the Mimico neighbourhood of Toronto and graduated from Mimico High School  He went on to complete the Music Industry Arts program at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario  Stroud worked for several years at the Toronto-based music video channel MuchMusic, and as a songwriter for the band New Regime before a Temagami canoe trip sparked a career change  During this time he also worked as garbage collector for the City of Toronto In 1990 Stroud became a guide for Black Feather Wilderness Adventures leading canoe excursions into the Northern Ontario wilds  It was also during this time while on a survival course he met his future wife, photographer Sue Jamison  They married in 1994 and together left for a year-long honeymoon in the remote Wabakimi area of Ontario which was to become the basis of the documentary Snowshoes and Solitude  Afterwards, the couple moved to Yellowknife in the Northwest Territories where Stroud was employed as an outdoor instructor to special needs individuals of aboriginal descent  Stroud and Jamison then settled in Huntsville, Ontario where they had two children and started both the outdoor instructional outfit Wilderness Voice and the media company Wilderness Spirit Productions Inspired by the popularity of the television show Survivor, Stroud pitched a more authentic version of the show to The Discovery Channel Canada  Stroud produced two programs titled One Week in the Wilderness  and Winter in the Wilderness for @discovery ca in 2001  The success of these specials led to the development of Survivorman, a show that followed a similar format of leaving Stroud on his own, with minimal equipment, in the wilderness to videotape his survival experience 

Film and television
After his marriage to  Jamison in 1994, the two of them spent one year in the Canadian wilderness to attempt a paleolithic existence  They travelled to Goldsborough Lake (50°41′55″N 89°20′46″W) deep in the Wabakimi, first building a tipi then an attached A-frame while using no metal, plastic, or otherwise manufactured tools  For the first half of the year, they took a store of traditional foods such as wild rice, squash, beaver and moose meat, bear fat, and maple sugar  In late September, Stroud's friends Doug Getgood and Fred Rowe brought in food for the next six months and chopped firewood for the couple  Stroud and Jamison built and equipped a winter cabin using an axe, a modern bow saw, and a trapper's tin wood stove left by Getgood and Rowe, along with a metal pot they found 
Family and medical emergencies brought them out of the bush on three occasions  Once when Stroud's father was dying from cancer, another when they both went to be treated for giardiasis, and again when Jamison had a miscarriage  Stroud filmed their primitive living experience and released the 50 minute documentary, Snowshoes and Solitude, which was named Best Documentary at the Muskoka Film Festival and Best Film at the Waterwalker Film Festival In 2001 Stroud produced two one-hour specials for the science news show @discovery ca  These segments follow the same format as Survivorman with Stroud filming his own survival in the wilderness  They were originally broadcast as daily segments over the course of one week but were repackaged as two one-hour specials titled Stranded  The popularity of these pilots spawned the show Survivorman  Stroud produced 23 episodes of the show which began airing in 2004  Stroud also composed and performed the opening theme music of Survivorman In 2006, Stroud produced a 90-minute special documenting his family's journey to building an off-the-grid home  The show, Off the Grid with Les Stroud, chronicled the process of buying property and refitting an old farm house with solar and wind power, a raincatcher and well, as well as the adjustments the Stroud family had to make to adapt to this style of living  Stroud has made multiple television appearances including on  The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, The View, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, and Larry King Live Stroud has also hosted an episode of the Discovery channel show I Shouldn't Be Alive titled Lost In The Snow, which aired during its first season and the TV program Surviving Urban Disasters, which aired on the Science Channel and the 20th annual Shark Week on the Discovery Channel In 2010, Stroud hosted and produced the Gemini nominated hit kids TV series Survive This and Survive This 2 (YTV, Cartoon Network) that takes teens into the wilderness to teach them how to survive by giving them some instruction and challenging them with survival scenarios  Stroud's follow-up show to Survivorman was titled Beyond Survival with Les Stroud and debuted in 2010 On April 27, 2018, National Geographic aired Stroud's Alaska's Grizzly Gauntlet on their NGW channel  In 4 episodes, Stroud explores the survival methods and social structure of the Kodiak brown bear 

Music
In addition to film making and wilderness survival, Stroud has also worked in the music industry as a professional musician  After graduation, Stroud worked both as an associate producer for the nascent music channel MuchMusic as well as production manager on music videos for artists such as Rush and Corey Hart  During this time Stroud also played in the David Bowie cover band Diamond Dogs and played lead guitar and composed music for his band New Regime which signed with RCA Records shortly after Stroud left the band As frequently illustrated in his show Survivorman, Stroud is considered an exceptional blues harmonica player 
This instrument is featured prominently in his self-titled debut CD which has been described as "a collection of diverse roots/blues and traditional folk, acoustic music that reflects the uniquely northern spirit of freedom and adventure " Several songs off of this album can be downloaded from his official site  Stroud has performed in and around the Muskoka area and at the Orillia Blues Festival and Toronto Beaches International Jazz Festival 
Stroud and The Northern Pikes have struck up a musical collaboration under the name Les Stroud and the Pikes  Throughout 2005 and 2006 they performed together live several times, and an EP born from this collaboration entitled Long Walk Home was released in the spring of 2007 

Awards
Stroud has received several accolades as a musician   He has won "Best Acoustic/Folk Act", "Best Blues Act" and "Best Overall" awards at the Spirit of the North music festival in New Liskeard, Ontario Stroud's documentary Snowshoes and Solitude was named Best Documentary at the Muskoka Film Festival and Best Film at the Waterwalker Film Festival Stroud was nominated for six Gemini Awards for his work on Survivorman  In 2010, Stroud and his production team was nominated for Best Children's or Youth Non-Fiction Program or Series for Survive This 

Personal life
Stroud has extensive experience with survival and primitive living skills, initially training with expert David Arama  He went on to study with many others including John "Prairie Wolf" McPherson Stroud has been an active participant in adventure racing and has competed at the Canadian championships In late 2008, Stroud and his wife, Sue Jamison, separated 
Passage 5:
The Island (U S  TV series)
The Island is an American survival skills reality television series, hosted by adventurer and survivalist Bear Grylls on NBC, which began airing on May 25, 2015 

Synopsis
Bear Grylls seeks to find out whether a modern American man can survive on a deserted island for one month without the luxuries or the basics of contemporary everyday life  Unlike traditional reality television shows, The Island does not include any prizes, eliminations, or winners 

Production
It is based on the British series The Island with Bear Grylls  The first season has six episodes  In the UK all episodes are available on All 4  In the series' premiere, fourteen men from various occupations and backgrounds are taken to a remote, uninhabited island by Bear Grylls, where they were left completely alone  Filming themselves, the men hunt for food, source water, erect shelter, build community and try to survive using only their strength, determination and know-how  They are equipped with limited tools, a basic medical kit, and a satellite phone for medical emergencies  On August 16, 2016, NBC cancelled The Island after one season 

Cast
Rob Brothers, Stay-at-home Father
Davion Carrillo, Firefighter
Taylor Cole, Radio Producer
Matthew Getz, Embedded Cameraman
Benji Lanpher, Embedded Cameraman
Earnest Marshall, Iraq War Veteran
Dakota Mortensen, Bird Farmer
Jim Murray, Retired Police Chief
Jud Nichols, Criminal Defense Attorney
Dr  Buck Parker M D , Trauma Surgeon
Michael Rossini, Engineer
Graham Sheldon, Embedded Cameraman
Rick Smith, Embedded Cameraman
Trey Williams, Digital Marketing ManagerEvacuated off the islandTaylor Cole (medical, episode 1)
Michael Rossini (medical, episode 2)
Davion Carrillo (medical, episode 3)
Earnest Marshall (personal issues episode 4)
Trey Williams (medical, episode 5)

Episodes
Passage 6:
Bear Grylls
Edward Michael "Bear" Grylls  (; born 7 June 1974) is a British adventurer, writer, television presenter and businessman  He first drew attention after embarking on a number of adventures, and then became widely known for his television series Man vs  Wild (2006–2011)  He is also involved in a number of wilderness survival television series in the UK and US, such as Running Wild with Bear Grylls and The Island with Bear Grylls  In July 2009, Grylls was appointed as The Scout Association’s youngest-ever Chief Scout of the United Kingdom and Overseas Territories at age 35, a post he has held for a second term since 2015 

Personal life
Grylls was born in Donaghadee, Northern Ireland on 7 June 1974  His family has a strong cricketing background, his grandfather Neville Ford and great-great-grandfather William Augustus Ford having both been first-class cricketers  He grew up in Donaghadee, Northern Ireland, until the age of four, when his family moved to Bembridge on the Isle of Wight He is the son of Conservative politician Sir Michael Grylls and his wife Sarah "Sally" (née Ford)  Grylls has one sibling, an elder sister, Lara Fawcett, who gave him the nickname 'Bear' when he was a week old From an early age, he learned to climb and sail with his father, who was a member of the prestigious Royal Yacht Squadron  As a teenager, he learned to skydive and earned a second dan black belt in Shotokan karate  He speaks English, Spanish, and French  He is an Anglican, and has described his Christian faith as the "backbone" in his life: "You can't keep God out  He's all around us, if we're just still enough to listen "Grylls married Shara Cannings Knight in 2000  They have three sons, born in 2003, 2006 and 2009 In August 2015, Grylls left his 11-year-old son on Saint Tudwal's Island along the North Wales coast, as the tide approached, leaving him to be rescued by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) as part of their weekly practice missions  The child was unharmed, though the RNLI later criticised Grylls for the stunt, saying its crew "had not appreciated" that a child would be involved Grylls used to be a vegan but now consumes a diet predominant in animal-based foods, fruits and honey 

Education
Grylls was educated at Eaton House, Ludgrove School and Eton College, where he helped start its first mountaineering club  He studied Spanish and German at the University of the West of England, Bristol and at Birkbeck College, where he graduated with a 2:2 bachelor's degree, obtained part-time, in Hispanic studies in 2002 

Military service
After leaving school, Grylls briefly hiked in the Himalayan mountains of Sikkim and West Bengal  From 1994–1997, he served in the Territorial Army with 21 SAS as a trooper  His time in the SAS ended as the result of a free fall parachuting accident in Kenya in 1996; his parachute failed to open, causing him to break three vertebrae In 2004, Grylls was awarded the honorary rank of lieutenant commander in the Royal Naval Reserve  Then in 2013 he was awarded the honorary rank of lieutenant colonel in the Royal Marines Reserve, and promoted to Honorary Colonel in June 2021 

Expeditions
Everest
On 16 May 1998, Grylls achieved his childhood dream of climbing to the summit of Mount Everest in Nepal, 18 months after breaking three vertebrae in a parachuting accident  At 23, he was at the time among the youngest people to have achieved this feat  There is some dispute over whether he was the youngest Briton to have done so, as he was preceded by James Allen, a climber holding dual Australian and British citizenship, who reached the summit in 1995 at age 22  The record has since been surpassed by Jake Meyer and then Rob Gauntlett who summitted at age 19  To prepare for climbing at such high altitudes in the Himalayas, in 1997, Grylls became the youngest Briton to climb Ama Dablam, a peak once described by Sir Edmund Hillary as "unclimbable", although now the third most popular in the Himalayas for permitted expeditions 

Circumnavigation of the UK
In 2000, Grylls led the team to circumnavigate the British Isles on jet skis, taking about 30 days, to raise money for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI)  He also rowed naked in a homemade bathtub along the Thames to raise funds for a friend who lost his legs in a climbing accident 

Crossing the North Atlantic
In 2003, he led a team of five, including his childhood friend, SAS colleague, and Mount Everest climbing partner Mick Crosthwaite, on an unassisted crossing of the north Atlantic Ocean, in an open rigid inflatable boat  Grylls and his team traveled in an eleven-metre-long boat and encountered force 8 gale winds with waves breaking over the boat while passing through icebergs in their journey from Halifax, Nova Scotia to John o' Groats, Scotland 

Dinner party at altitude
In 2005, alongside the balloonist and mountaineer David Hempleman-Adams and Lieutenant Commander Alan Veal, leader of the Royal Navy Freefall Parachute Display Team, Grylls created a world record for the highest open-air formal dinner party, which they did under a hot-air balloon at 7,600 metres (25,000 ft), dressed in full mess dress and oxygen masks  To train for the event, he made over 200 parachute jumps  This event was in aid of The Duke of Edinburgh's Award and The Prince's Trust 

Paramotoring over the Himalayas
In 2007, Grylls embarked on a record-setting Parajet paramotor in Himalayas near Mount Everest  He took off from 4,400 metres (14,500 ft), 8 miles (13 km) south of the mountain  Grylls reported looking down on the summit during his ascent and coping with temperatures of −60 °C (−76 °F)  He endured dangerously low oxygen levels and eventually reached 9,000 metres (29,500 ft), almost 3,000 metres (10,000 ft) higher than the previous record of 6,102 metres (20,019 ft)  The feat was filmed for Discovery Channel worldwide as well as Channel 4 in the UK  While Grylls initially planned to cross over Everest itself, the permit was only to fly to the south of Everest, and he did not traverse Everest out of risk of violating Chinese airspace 

Journey Antarctica 2008
In 2008, Grylls led a team of four to climb one of the most remote unclimbed peaks in the world in Antarctica, to raise funds for children's charity Global Angels and promote the use of alternative energies  During this mission the team also aimed to explore the coast of Antarctica by inflatable boat and jetski, part powered by bioethanol, and then to travel across some of the vast ice desert by wind-powered kite-ski and electric powered paramotor  However, the expedition was cut short after Grylls suffered a broken shoulder while kite skiing across a stretch of ice  Travelling at speeds up to 50 km/h (30 mph), a ski caught on the ice, launching him in the air and breaking his shoulder when he came down  He had to be medically evacuated 

Longest indoor freefall
Grylls, along with the double amputee Al Hodgson and the Scotsman Freddy MacDonald, set a Guinness world record in 2008 for the longest continuous indoor freefall  The previous record was 1 hour 36 minutes by a US team  Grylls, Hodgson, and MacDonald, using a vertical wind tunnel in Milton Keynes, broke the record by a few seconds  The attempt was in support of the charity Global Angels 

Northwest Passage expedition
In September 2010, Grylls led a team of five to take an ice-breaking rigid-inflatable boat (RIB) through 5,700 nautical miles (10,600 km) of the ice-strewn Northwest Passage  The expedition intended to raise awareness of the effects of global warming and to raise money for children's charity Global Angels 

Career
Books
Grylls' first book, Facing Up (UK)/The Kid Who Climbed Everest (US), described his expedition and achievements climbing to the summit of Mount Everest  His second was Facing the Frozen Ocean  His third book Born Survivor: Bear Grylls was written to accompany the TV series of the same name  He also wrote an extreme guide to outdoor pursuits, titled Bear Grylls Outdoor Adventures In 2011, Grylls released his autobiography, Mud, Sweat and Tears: The Autobiography, followed by A Survival Guide for Life in late 2012 and True Grit in 2013 Grylls also wrote the Mission Survival series of children's adventure survival books titled: Mission Survival: Gold of the Gods, Mission Survival: Way of the Wolf, Mission Survival: Sands of the Scorpion, Mission Survival: Tracks of the Tiger and Mission Survival: Claws of the Crocodile  He has written two thriller novels based around his character Will Jaeger; Ghost Flight released in 2015 and Burning Angels in 2016 In 2019, Grylls published a Christian devotional titled Soul Fuel In October 2021, Grylls released his second autobiography, Never Give Up; covering some of his most memorable events and adventures In 2022, Grylls published Mind Fuel: Simple Ways to Build Mental Resilience Every Day   Grylls told The Christian Post that it "offers honest and practical ways to practice better mental health    a crucial part of living a healthy, God-glorying life "In April 2023, Grylls released You Vs the World: The Bear Grylls Guide to Never Giving Up; a motivational book aimed at children 

Television
Grylls was used by the UK Ministry of Defence to head the Army's anti-drugs TV campaign, and featured in the first ever major advertising campaign for Harrods  Grylls has been a guest on numerous talk shows including Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, The Oprah Winfrey Show, Late Night with Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Attack of the Show!, Late Show with David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel Live! and Harry Hill's TV Burp  Grylls recorded two advertisements for Post's Trail Mix Crunch Cereal, which aired in the US from January 2009  He also appeared as a "distinguished instructor" in Dos Equis' Most Interesting Academy in a webisode named "Survival in the Modern Era"  He appeared in a five-part web series that demonstrates urban survival techniques and features Grylls going from bush to bash  He also has marketed the Alpha Course, a course on the basics of the Christian faith  In 2013, Grylls appeared in an airline safety video for Air New Zealand entitled Bear Essentials of Safety, filmed against the backdrop of the Routeburn Track on the southern tip of New Zealand's South Island  In 2014, Grylls appeared on Piers Morgan's Life Stories 

Escape to the Legion
Grylls filmed a four-part TV show in 2005, called Escape to the Legion, which followed Grylls and eleven other "recruits" as they took part in a shortened re-creation of the French Foreign Legion's basic desert training in the Sahara  The show was first broadcast in the UK on Channel 4, and in the US on the Military Channel 

Born Survivor/Man vs  Wild
Grylls hosts a series titled Born Survivor: Bear Grylls for the British Channel 4 and broadcast as Man vs  Wild in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India, and the United States, and as Ultimate Survival on the Discovery Channel in Europe, Asia, and Africa  The series features Grylls dropped into inhospitable places, showing viewers how to survive  Man vs  Wild debuted in 2006, and its success led it to lasting seven seasons over five years 
The show has featured stunts including Grylls climbing cliffs, parachuting from helicopters, balloons, and planes, paragliding, ice climbing, running through a forest fire, wading rapids, eating snakes, wrapping his urine-soaked T-shirt around his head to help stave off the desert heat, drinking urine saved in a rattlesnake skin, drinking fecal liquid from elephant dung, eating deer droppings, wrestling alligators, field dressing a camel carcass and drinking water from it, eating various "creepy crawlies" [insects], using the corpse of a sheep as a sleeping bag and flotation device, free climbing waterfalls and using a bird guano/water enema for hydration The show caused controversy after a programme consultant revealed that Grylls actually stayed in a hotel on some nights — including an episode in Hawaii in which Grylls was ostensibly stranded on a deserted island — and that certain scenes were staged for him  Grylls subsequently apologized to viewers who might have felt misled In March 2012, the Discovery Channel dropped Grylls from its lineup because of a contractual dispute, although he has subsequently worked with them again 
In August 2019, Bear Grylls appeared with Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi in a special episode shot in the India's Jim Corbett National Park, Uttarakhand  The episode was showcased in more than 180 countries across the world on the Discovery, Inc  network 

Worst-Case Scenario
In 2010, Grylls came out with a new project titled Worst-Case Scenario which aired on Discovery in the US  It is based on the popular books of the same name  Twelve episodes were produced before the show was cancelled 

Bear's Wild Weekend
In 2011, he made two specials under the title Bear's Wild Weekend for Channel 4 in the UK which was broadcast over the Christmas holiday that year  Each special featured Grylls taking either Jonathan Ross or Miranda Hart on short two-day adventures; Ross to rainforest in the Canary Islands, Hart to the Swiss Alps  These screened in the US under the title Bear Grylls' Wild Adventure  A third episode with Stephen Fry, this time in the Dolomite mountains of South Tyrol, screened in late 2013 In 2014, two further episodes were aired in the UK under the title Wild Weekends  The first of these was the 2011 special of Man vs  Wild featuring Jake Gyllenhaal, and the second was the Running Wild episode featuring Ben Stiller 

Get Out Alive
Grylls hosted Get Out Alive with Bear Grylls, a reality competition series filmed in New Zealand, which premiered on NBC on 8 July 2013 

Escape from Hell
In Bear Grylls: Escape from Hell, he reveals the true life stories of ordinary people trapped in extraordinary situations of survival  The six-episode series premiered on the Discovery Channel in the UK on 4 October 2013, and in the US on 11 November 2013 

The Island
He presented The Island with Bear Grylls, first shown on Channel 4 on 5 May 2014  An American version of the show was also made and it premiered on 25 May 2015 on NBC 

Running Wild with Bear Grylls
In this adventure TV series from NBC, which premiered on 28 July 2014, Grylls takes celebrities on a two-day trip in the wilderness  The celebrities who took part in Season 1 are Zac Efron, Ben Stiller, Tamron Hall, Deion Sanders, Channing Tatum, and Tom Arnold  Celebrities who took part in Season 2 were Kate Winslet, Kate Hudson, Drew Brees, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Ed Helms, Michelle Rodriguez, Ajay Devgan, Akshay Kumar, Rajanikanth, India's prime minister Narendra Modi, James Marsden, Michael B  Jordan, and President Barack Obama 

Mission Survive
In 2015, he began presenting the six-part ITV series Bear Grylls: Mission Survive which features eight celebrities on a twelve-day survival mission  The series began airing on 20 February 2015  Mission Survive returned for a second series in 2016 

Bear Grylls Survival School
In 2016, he presented a CITV series called Bear Grylls Survival School  Filming started in August 2015  The series began airing on 10 January 2016  A second series was scheduled to begin on 7 January 2017 

Survivor Games
In summer 2015, China's Dragon TV ordered a Grylls-fronted adventure series titled Survivor Games (Chinese: 跟着贝尔去冒险)  The series featured Grylls and eight Chinese celebrities and premiered on Dragon TV on 16 October 2015 

Bear's Mission
In 2018, ITV began airing a new series similar to the USA series "Running Wild with Bear Grylls" called "Bear's Mission with   "  This show focuses on one British celebrity taking an overnight adventure with Bear each episode  The series premiered on ITV on early 2018 

You vs  Wild
Later, Grylls went on to release an interactive series on streaming service Netflix 

World's Toughest Race: Eco-Challenge Fiji
Grylls presented the revival of the Eco-Challenge series, which is titled World's Toughest Race: Eco-Challenge Fiji  It involved teams from around the world competing in an adventure race, which took place in Fiji  The series premiered on Amazon Prime Video on 14 August 2020 

Bear Grylls Wild Adventure
Spring 2021, two-part ITV series featuring Jonny Wilkinson and Nicola Adams, respectively 

Running Wild With Bear Grylls: The Challenge
Premiered in July 2022, it is a spin-off of Grylls' long running Running Wild With Bear Grylls series 

Bear Grylls Meets President Zelenskyy
In this documentary that aired on Channel 4 on 28 March 2023, Grylls travels to Ukraine to meet President Zelenskyy and to meet civilians caught up in the war with Russia 

I Survived Bear Grylls
Upcoming eight-part competition series; co-hosted with comedian Jordan Conley 

Motivational speaking
Outside of TV, Grylls works as a motivational speaker, giving speeches worldwide to corporations, churches, schools, and other organisations 

Be Military Fit
Bear Grylls Ventures and NM Capital purchased British Military Fitness in September 2018 and re-branded as "Be Military Fit with Bear Grylls", to retain the existing abbreviation BMF  The company runs outdoor group fitness classes in 140 public parks and outdoor spaces across the United Kingdom  The classes are led by former or serving members of the British Armed Forces with recognised fitness training qualifications  It is Europe's largest outdoor fitness company 

Charity and politics
Grylls is an ambassador for The Prince's Trust, an organisation which provides training, financial, and practical support to young people in the United Kingdom Global Angels, a UK charity which seeks to aid children around the world, were the beneficiaries of his 2007 accomplishment of taking a powered para-glider higher than Mount Everest  Grylls' held the highest ever dinner party at 7,600 metres (25,000 ft) in aid of The Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme, and launched the 50th anniversary of the Awards  His successful circumnavigation of Britain on jet skis raised money for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution 
Grylls' Everest climb was in aid of SSAFA Forces Help, a British-based charitable organisation set up to help former and serving members of the British Armed Forces and their families and dependents  His 2003 Arctic expedition detailed in the book Facing the Frozen Ocean was in aid of The Prince's Trust  His 2005 attempt to para-motor over the Angel Falls was in aid of the charity Hope and Homes for Children In August 2010, Grylls continued his fund-raising work for Global Angels by undertaking an expedition through the Northwest Passage in a rigid inflatable boat  Many of his expeditions also support environmental causes such as his Antarctica expedition and his circumnavigation of Britain which tested a pioneering new fuel made from rubbish  In 2011, Grylls was in New Zealand during the February 2011 Christchurch earthquake  Following the incident, he appeared on New Zealand advertisements encouraging people to donate money to help rebuild the city Grylls is also an ambassador for Care for Children, an organisation that partners with governments in Asia to help create a positive alternative to institutional care through local family-based care for disadvantaged children  In 2014, Grylls designed a Scouts-themed Paddington Bear statue, one of fifty located around London prior to the release of the film Paddington, which was auctioned to raise funds for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) Grylls said he spoke "from the heart" in backing "Remain" in the 2016 referendum  "At such a time for the UK to retreat, run and cut ourselves loose from Europe, when there are so many challenges on our doorstep, to me just doesn't feel either courageous or kind," he said  "Europe has many flaws, but I also believe the way to help resolve many of those tough issues is from within    I have never been a good quitter and I am so proud of the UK and our values: tolerance, kindness, respect, courage and resilience  This is why I want us to stay together and Remain in Europe " In January 2020, he announced that he had asserted his right to Irish citizenship and had obtained an Irish passport Grylls was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in the 2019 Birthday Honours for services to young people, the media and charity 

Positions in Scouting
Designation of Chief Ambassador of World Scouting
On 16 November 2018, The World Organization of the Scout Movement announced the appointment of Bear Grylls as its first Chief Ambassador  Upon his appointment, he said "I'm very proud and humbled to take on this new role as Chief Ambassador of World Scouting and continue to promote the great work Scouting is doing across the globe  Scouting is a worldwide force for good that unites young people with positive values and an adventurous spirit  We aim to make a difference in our communities, help young people learn new skills, and be kind to all people "Bear has long been a supporter of Scouting around the world often visiting Scout groups on his filming missions and appeared at the 24th World Scout Jamboree in his role as Chief Ambassador

Term as Chief Scout of the Scout Association
On 17 May 2009, The Scout Association announced Grylls would be appointed Chief Scout following the end of Peter Duncan's five-year term in July 2009  He was officially made Chief Scout at Gilwell 24 on 11 July 2009 in a handover event featuring Peter Duncan in front of a crowd of over 3,000 Explorer Scouts  He is the tenth person to hold the position and the youngest Chief Scout since the role was created for Robert Baden-Powell in 1920 On 9 April 2015, The Scout Association announced that Grylls would continue as Chief Scout until 2018  Grylls wrote, "I am so proud that the largest youth movement on the planet has asked me to continue in my role as UK Chief Scout "On 5 June 2015, Grylls, in an interview with The Telegraph, praised the challenge of being Britain's youngest Chief Scout, saying "Scouting humbles me every day"  He remains Chief Scout in 2022 

Ambasador in United24
On 29 March 2023, Bear Grylls has become an ambassador for the UNITED24 platform  His education company BecomingX, together with Amazon and Accenture, is developing the BecomingX Ukraine learning platform for Ukrainians 

See also
Scouting portal
Context 3: Passage 1:
Sven Nys
Sven Nys (Dutch: [ˌsfɛˈnɛis]; born 17 June 1976) is a former professional cyclist competing in cyclo-cross and mountain bike  With two world championships, seven world cups, and over 140 competitive victories, he is considered one of the best cyclo-cross racers of his generation, and remains a prominent figure in cyclo-cross  Apart from cyclo-cross, Nys is also fivefold national mountainbike champion, and has competed in that discipline in two Olympic games 

Career overview
Early years
Born in Bonheiden, Belgium, Nys began racing BMX at the age of 8  He won eight BMX national titles before switching to cyclocross, a more popular sport in Belgium  He won the under-23 world championship in 1997 and 1998, beating another Belgian, Bart Wellens  Nys moved to the elite category in 1998–1999, joining the Dutch Rabobank team 

Becoming elite
In the elite class he won the Superprestige competition and came third in the national championships  The next season, he won the Superprestige again, ended the World Cup as leader and became Belgian champion  This made him favourite for the 2000 world championship  But his Rabobank management told him not to beat his teammate, the Dutchman Richard Groenendaal  Groenendaal sprinted away from the start and Nys was forced to hold back and not help another Belgian, Mario De Clercq, chase him  Groenendaal won and Nys, who came third, was criticised in Belgium for choosing team over country  The Royal Belgian Cycling League demanded an explanation  It became more forgiving but the head coach, Erik De Vlaeminck, remained unconvinced Nys blamed an injury for not winning a season-long competition or championship in 2000–2001  A year later he won the World Cup and the Superprestige again  In the world championships that year he came third after being outsprinted by De Clercq and Tom Vannoppen  The following season Nys won the Superprestige for the fourth time as well as the Gazet van Antwerpen trophy for a first time  He became Belgian champion again, but Wellens won the world championship and the World Cup 
Wellens dominated 2003–2004  Nys' chance for the World Cup ended when other Belgians sprinted past him, taking points  Nys was angry that his countrymen had allowed Groenendaal, a Dutchman, to win the World Cup rather than him  That evening Nys decided from then on to ride for himself 

This is war  Thanks Vannoppen, thanks Van der Linden  This is the last thing I have done for the Belgian team  They can all go to hell  [   ] Apparently there are some who take joy out of me not winning the World Cup  I know who and will take that into account next year  National team coach Rudy De Bie told me that he has never seen anything like this before  Our country loses the World Cup today 

The cannibal
Nys won everything of importance and at the end of 2004–2005 won the national and world championships, ended number one in the UCI rankings and World Cup, the Superprestige and the Gazet van Antwerpen Trophy  He is the only cyclo-crosser to achieve such dominance  Nys came close to repeating the feat the following season but he gave up in the world championship after a fall on the last lap 
Nys won all eight Superprestige races in 2006–2007  In the Superprestige he won 13 races from Hoogstraten in 2005 to Asper Gaver in 2007  That season he won the World Cup and the Gazet van Antwerpen trophy again, but neither the national or world championship  The national involved a lot of running, not Nys' talent, and were won by Wellens  At the world championship in Hooglede-Gits Nys fell three times: over Wellens, who fell because a television motor had hit one of the road markers; over Erwin Vervecken; and because of an error of his own  He finished 11th 
The following season, Nys won the World Cup, the Superprestige and the Gazet van Anterwerpen trophy again  He also won his fifth national championship  The Dutchman Lars Boom became champion of the world and Zdeněk Štybar took the silver, both barely 22 at the time  Nys, already nearing 32, came third 

Nys switched teams from Rabobank to Landbouwkrediet-Tönissteiner  Niels Albert, 2008's U23 world champion, joined the elite category that season, giving Nys another opponent  But Nys won all the season-long competitions and the national championship  Albert won the world championship, Štybar was second and Nys third  The Belgian press referred to Albert, Štybar and Nys as De Grote Drie (The Big Three), it was clear that Nys' years of absolute domination were behind him 
In his second mountain bike race Nys won the Belgian championship and then came ninth at the Olympic Games in 2008  On 31 December 2006 Nys won his 150th race with the elites, at Diegem  Four years later, he scored his 300th career win at the Koppenbergcross, one of the toughest races in the season 
Nys was appointed as a member of the inaugural UCI Athletes' Commission in 2011 In 2013 Nys won the world championship a second time  He said his career was now complete On 10 February 2013, Nys won his 60th race in the Superprestige On 22 November 2015, Nys won the Koksijde round of the UCI Cyclo-cross World Cup in Belgium, his fiftieth victory in the series  His win came seventeen years and a day after his first World Cup victory Sven Nys called a halt to his career on 5–6 March 2016 at an event called "Merci Sven" which was held at the Antwerp Sportpaleis (Belgium) 

Post cycling career
After ending his active cyclocross career Nys bought the cyclocross team Telenet–Fidea Lions of which he is the general manager  He is also a motivational speaker, during his keynotes he shares information about his experiences during his cycling career 

Major results
Cyclo-cross
Major championship results
UCI World Cup results
Superprestige
BPost Bank Trophy
Up until the season 2011–2012, this competition was called the Gazet van Antwerpen Trophy (GvA) 

Mountain Bike
Road
Passage 2:
Anton Villatoro
Anton Villatoro (born June 10, 1970 in Guatemala City, Guatemala) is a Guatemalan former professional cyclist  He attended the University of Colorado, where he raced with future US Postal teammate Tyler Hamilton  Villatoro won the 1991 Junior Tour of Guatemala, a gold medal at the 1994 Central American Games (team time trial) and placed fourth at the 1995 Pan American Games (time trial)  In 1996, he represented Guatemala at the Olympic Games in Atlanta 
He raced for the US Postal Service Cycling Team from 1996–1998 and then served as team captain for Team 7-UP from 1999 to 2000 
He retired in 2001 to pursue business interests 
Passage 3:
Jennifer Parilla
Jennifer Parilla (born January 9, 1981) is an American trampolinist who was born in Newport Beach, California   She was the first and only American to qualify to the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney as a trampolinist when the sport debuted; and finished in 9th place   She competed for the US at the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics 
She was on the national team for eleven years from 1993 to 2004; her favorite event was trampoline but she also competed successfully on the double mini  She was the National Champion in 1998, 2000, 2002, 2003, and 2004 on the trampoline, and on the double mini in 1998 and 1999   She earned national titles in 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, and 1998 in synchronized trampoline, bringing her total national title count to twelve She was inducted into the USA Gymnastics Hall of Fame in 2010 

Personal life
Jennifer's hometown is Lake Forest, California but she now resides in Newport Beach  She trained with Team Everybody gymnastics club and was coached by Lionel Rangel  Jennifer attended Orange Coast College and California State Polytechnic University in Pomona 
Jennifer is one of two children to Paul and Jan Parilla; she has an older brother named Steve   She is currently the Trampoline and Tumbling Director at National Gymnastics Training Center in Aliso Viejo, California 

International competition
2003 World Championships, Hannover, GER; 16th-Trampoline
2003 World Cup, Prague, CZE; 4th-Trampoline
2003 World Cup, Ostend, BEL; 18th-Trampoline
2003 Canada Cup, Oakville, O N , CAN; 8th-Trampoline
2002 World Cup, Mykolayiv, UKR; 11th – Trampoline
2001 World Championships, Odense, DEN; 19th – Trampoline
2000 Summer Olympics, Sydney, AUS; 9th-Trampoline
2000 World Cup, Sydney, AUS; 6th – Trampoline (4th vs  Olympic Field)
2000 Olympic Test Event, Sydney, AUS; 6th – Trampoline (4th vs  Olympic Field)
1999 Olympic Selection; 9th – Trampoline
1999 World Championships, Sun City, RSA; 7th – Synchro, 17th – Trampoline
1999 French Nationals, Toulouse, FRA; 1st – Synchro
1998 World Championships, Sydney, AUS; 2nd – Double Mini, 3rd – Team Double Mini
1997 Trampoline World cup final, Frankfurt, GER; 5th – Trampoline
1997 Indo-Pacific Championships, Durban, RSA; 3rd – Double mini
1997 Trampoline World Cup Final, Sydney, AUS; 4th – Trampoline
1996 Trampoline World Cup, Frankfurt, GER; 2nd Trampoline
1996 World Championships, Vancouver, CAN; 6th – Synchro, 7th – Trampoline
1995 Trampoline World Cup, Vancouver, CAN; 7th – Trampoline
1994 World Championships, Porto, POR; 1st – Team Double Mini
1994 World Age Group Games, Vila De Conde, POR; 1st - Trampoline 2nd – Double Mini

National Competition
2004 U S  Olympic Team Trials, San Jose, Calif ; 1st - Trampoline
2004 Visa U S  Championships, Nashville, Tenn ; 1st - Trampoline
2003 U S  Championships, Sacramento, Calif ; 1st – Trampoline
2003 Winter Classic, Tampa, Fla ; 2nd - Trampoline
2002 National Championships, Cleveland, Ohio; 1st – Trampoline
2002 U S  Elite Challenge, Indianapolis, Ind ; 1st – Trampoline
2002 Winter Classic, Indianapolis, Ind ; 4th – Trampoline
2001 National Championships, San Antonio, Texas; 11th - Trampoline
2000 National Championships, St  Louis, Mo ; 1st – Trampoline
1999 U S  World Team Trials, Sacramento, Calif ; 1st – Trampoline, 1st – Synchro - 2nd Double Mini
1999 U S  World Team Trials, Knoxville, Tenn ; 1st – trampoline, 1st – Double Mini, 1st - Synchro
1999 National Championships, Anaheim, Calif  ; 1st – Double Mini
1998 National Championships, St  Paul, Minn ; 1st – Trampoline, 1st – Syncro, 1st – Double Mini
1996 National Championships, Phoenix Ariz ; 1st – Synchro, 3rd – Trampoline
1995 National Championships, Denver, Colo ; 1st – Synchro, 2nd – Trampoline, 3rd – Double Mini
1994 National Championships, Nashville, Tenn ; 1st - Synchro, 4th – Double Mini
1993 National Championships; San Diego, Calif ; 1st - Synchro
Passage 4:
Kurt Betschart
Kurt Betschart born 25 August 1968 in Erstfeld Switzerland is a former professional cyclist  He was a Six Day Track specialist holding a world record 37 victories with the same partner, Bruno Risi  He had a total of 47 professional victories and represented Switzerland at the Olympic games  After sixteen years in professional cycling Kurt retired on 26 July 2006 

Olympic Games
2000 Summer Olympics - Sydney
11th, Men's Madison (Track cycling)

Palmares
Passage 5:
Eddy Schepers
Eddy Schepers (born 12 December 1955) is a Belgian former professional cyclist  He was a professional cyclist from 1978 to 1990 where he rode for many teams including C&A, Carrera and Fagor–MBK  He started out in the C&A cycling team of Belgian Eddy Merckx before riding for various teams  He competed in the individual road race event at the 1976 Summer Olympics In 1986 he rode alongside Irish cyclist Stephen Roche for the first time in the Carrera cycling team and he became a loyal teammate of Roche that year  During the following year, Schepers was instrumental in Roche winning the 1987 Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France in supporting him on the road and also against the rest of the team who wanted the Italian Roberto Visentini to win the Giro d'Italia  On the fifth stage of the 1987 Giro d'Italia, Schepers let his breakaway companion Jean-Claude Bagot take the stage win in exchange for team support from Bagot's Fagor team if it was called upon in the future  In spite of working for Roche in the Giro d'Italia, Schepers still managed to place 12th in the general classification  Again in the 1987 edition of the Tour de France, Schepers provided Roche with crucial support while the rest of the team did not  Afterwards Schepers went with Roche to the Fagor team but with Roche past his peak due to chronic knee injury, their association stopped  Schepers spent his last year in the peloton riding for the Belgian team Tulip Computers 
His career victories include the overall of the Tour de l'Avenir stage race in 1977 and the first stage of the 1985 Tour de Romandie 

Major results
Passage 6:
2000 Summer Olympics
The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 (Dharug: Gadigal 2000), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from 15 September to 1 October 2000 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia  It marked the second time the Summer Olympics were held in Australia, and in the Southern Hemisphere, the first being in Melbourne, in 1956 
Sydney was selected as the host city for the 2000 Games in 1993  Teams from 199 countries participated in the 2000 Games, which were the first to feature at least 300 events in its official sports programme  The Games' cost was estimated to be A$6 6 billion  These were the final Olympic Games under the IOC presidency of Juan Antonio Samaranch before the arrival of his successor Jacques Rogge  The 2000 Games were the last of the two consecutive Summer Olympics to be held in a predominantly English-speaking country following the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, United States 
The final medal tally at the 2000 Summer Olympics was led by the United States, followed by Russia and China with host Australia at fourth place overall  Cameroon, Colombia, Latvia, Mozambique and Slovenia won a gold medal for the first time in their Olympic histories, while Barbados, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam won their first ever Olympic medals  Australia will host the Summer Olympics again in 2032 at Brisbane, Queensland making it the first Oceanian country to host the Olympics three times 
The 2000 Games received universal acclaim, with the organisation, volunteers, sportsmanship, and Australian public being lauded in the international media  Bill Bryson of The Times called the Sydney Games "one of the most successful events on the world stage", saying that they "couldn't be better"  James Mossop of the Electronic Telegraph called the Games "such a success that any city considering bidding for future Olympics must be wondering how it can reach the standards set by Sydney", while Jack Todd of the Montreal Gazette suggested that the "IOC should quit while it's ahead  Admit there can never be a better Olympic Games, and be done with it," as "Sydney was both exceptional and the best"  These games would provide the inspiration for London's winning bid for the 2012 Olympic Games in 2005; in preparing for the 2012 Games, Lord Coe declared the 2000 Games the "benchmark for the spirit of the Games, unquestionably", admitting that the London organising committee "attempted in a number of ways to emulate what the Sydney Organising Committee did "

Host city selection
Sydney won the right to host the Games on 24 September 1993, after being selected over Beijing, Berlin, Istanbul and Manchester in four rounds of voting, at the 101st IOC Session in Monte Carlo, Monaco  The Australian city of Melbourne who also hosted the 1956 Summer Olympics had lost out to Atlanta for the 1996 Summer Olympics three years earlier  Beijing would later be selected to host the 2008 Summer Olympics eight years later on 13 July 2001 and the 2022 Winter Olympics twenty-two years later on 31 July 2015  Beijing's loss to Sydney was seen as a "significant blow" to an "urgent political priority" of the Chinese Communist Party leadership having mounted the most intense and expensive candidacy campaign at the date so far(this include the Summer and Winter Games)  Although it is unknown as two members of the International Olympic Committee voted for Sydney over Beijing in 1993, it appears that an important role was played by Human Rights Watch's campaign to "stop Beijing" because of China's human rights record and international isolation following the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests  Many in China were angry at what they saw as U S -led interference in the vote, and the outcome contributed to rising anti-Western sentiment in China and a new phase at the tensions in Sino-American relations 

Costs
The Oxford Olympics Study 2016 estimates the outturn cost of the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics at US$5 billion in 2015-dollars and cost overrun at 90% in real terms  This includes sports-related costs only, that is, (i) operational costs incurred by the organising committee for the purpose of staging the Games, e g , expenditures for technology, transportation, workforce, administration, security, catering, ceremonies, and medical services, and (ii) direct capital costs incurred by the host city and country or private investors to build, e g , the competition venues, the Olympic village, international broadcast centre, and media and press centre, which are required to host the Games  Indirect capital costs are not included, such as for road, rail, or airport infrastructure, or for hotel upgrades or other business investment incurred in preparation for the Games but not directly related to staging the Games  The cost for Sydney 2000 compares with a cost of US$4 6 billion for Rio 2016, US$40–44 billion for Beijing 2008 and US$51 billion for Sochi 2014, the most expensive Olympics in history  The average cost for the Summer Games since 1960 is US$5 2 billion, average cost overrun is 176% 
In 2000, the Auditor-General of New South Wales reported that the Sydney Games cost A$6 6 billion, with a net cost to the public between A$1 7 and A$2 4 billion  In the years leading up to the games, funds were shifted from education and health programs to cover Olympic expenses It has been estimated that the economic impact of the 2000 Olympics was that A$2 1 billion has been shaved from public consumption  Economic growth was not stimulated to a net benefit and in the years after 2000, foreign tourism to NSW grew by less than tourism to Australia as a whole  A "multiplier" effect on broader economic development was not realised, as a simple "multiplier" analysis fails to capture is that resources have to be redirected from elsewhere: the building of a stadium is at the expense of other public works such as extensions to hospitals  Building sporting venues does not add to the aggregate stock of productive capital in the years following the Games: "Equestrian centres, softball compounds and man-made rapids are not particularly useful beyond their immediate function "Many venues that were constructed in Sydney Olympic Park failed financially in the years immediately following the Olympics to meet the expected bookings to meet upkeep expenses  It was only the 2003 Rugby World Cup which reconnected the park back to citizens  In recent years, infrastructure costs for some facilities have been of growing concern to the NSW Government, especially facilities in Western Sydney  Proposed metro and light rail links from Olympic Park to Parramatta have been estimated to cost in the same order of magnitude as the public expenditure on the games  Stadium Australia had been considered for demolition in 2017 by then NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian, citing that the stadium was "built for an Olympics" but not for modern spectators  The plan was scrapped in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic  The Dunc Gray Velodrome has also struggled to keep up its $500,000 per year maintenance costs, although it is still used for track cycling events 

Chronological summary of the 2000 Summer Olympics
Preliminary matches
Although the Opening Ceremony was not scheduled until 15 September, the football competitions began with preliminary matches on 13 September  Among the pre-ceremony fixtures, host nation Australia lost 1–0 to Italy at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, which was the main stadium for the 1956 Melbourne Olympics 

Day 1: 15 September
Cultural display highlights
The opening ceremony began with a tribute to the Australian pastoral heritage of the Australian stockmen and the importance of the stock horse in Australia's heritage  It was produced and filmed by the Sydney Olympic Broadcasting Organisation and the home nation broadcaster Channel 7  This was introduced by lone rider Steve Jefferys and his rearing Australian Stock Horse Ammo  At the cracking of Jefferys' stockwhip, a further 120 riders entered the stadium, their stock horses performing intricate steps, including forming the five Olympic Rings, to a special Olympics version of the theme, which Bruce Rowland had previously composed for the 1982 film The Man from Snowy River 
The Australian National Anthem was sung, the first verse by Human Nature and the second by Julie Anthony 
The ceremony continued, showing many aspects of the land and its people: the affinity of the mainly coastal-dwelling Australians with the sea that surrounds the "Island Continent"  The indigenous occupation of the land, the coming of the First Fleet, the continued immigration from many nations and the rural industry on which the economy of the nation was built, including a display representing the harshness of rural life based on the paintings of Sir Sidney Nolan  Two memorable scenes were the representation of the "Heart" of the country by 200 Aboriginal women from Central Australia who danced up "the mighty spirit of God to protect the Games" and the overwhelmingly noisy representation of the construction industry by hundreds of tap-dancing teenagers 
Because Bibi Salisachs (the wife of IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch) was seriously ill and unable to accompany her husband to the Olympics, Dawn Fraser, former Australian Olympic Champion swimmer and member of the Parliament of New South Wales, accompanied Samaranch during the Australian cultural display, explaining to him some of the cultural references that are unfamiliar to non-Australians 

Formal presentation
A record 199 nations entered the stadium, with a record 80 of them winning at least one medal  The only missing IOC member was Afghanistan, who was banned due to the extremist rule of the Taliban's oppression of women and its prohibition of sports  The ceremony featured a unified entrance by the athletes of North and South Korea, using a specially designed unification flag: a white background flag with a blue map of the Korean Peninsula  Four athletes from East Timor also marched in the parade of nations as individual Olympic athletes and marched directly before the host country  Although the country-to-be had no National Olympic Committee then, they were allowed to compete under the Olympic Flag with country code IOA  The Governor-General, Sir William Deane, opened the games 
The Olympic Flag was carried around the arena by eight former Australian Olympic champions: Bill Roycroft, Murray Rose, Liane Tooth, Gillian Rolton, Marjorie Jackson, Lorraine Crapp, Michael Wenden and Nick Green  During the raising of the Olympics Flag, the Olympic Hymn was sung by the Millennium Choir of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia in Greek  Following this, Tina Arena sang a purpose-written pop song, The Flame The opening ceremony concluded with the lighting of the Olympic Flame, which was brought into the stadium by former Australian Olympic champion Herb Elliott  Then, celebrating 100 years of women's participation in the Olympic Games, former Australian women Olympic medalists Betty Cuthbert and Raelene Boyle, Dawn Fraser, Shirley Strickland (later Shirley Strickland de la Hunty), Shane Gould and Debbie Flintoff-King brought the torch through the stadium, handing it over to Cathy Freeman, who lit the flame in the cauldron within a circle of fire  The  choice of Freeman, an Aboriginal woman, to light the flame was notable given the history of human rights abuses against Aboriginal people in Australia  Following her lighting, Freeman was the subject of racial abuse from some Australians  The planned spectacular climax to the ceremony was delayed by the technical glitch of a computer switch which malfunctioned, causing the sequence to shut down by giving a false reading  This meant that the Olympic flame was suspended in mid-air for about four minutes rather than immediately rising up a water-covered ramp to the top of the stadium  When the cause of the problem was discovered, the program was overridden and the cauldron continued its course, and the ceremony concluded with a fireworks display 

Day 2: 16 September
The first medals of the Games were awarded in the women's 10 metre air rifle competition, which was won by Nancy Johnson of the United States 
The Triathlon made its Olympic debut with the women's race  Set in the surroundings of the Sydney Opera House, Brigitte McMahon representing Switzerland swam, cycled and ran to the first gold medal in the sport, beating the favoured home athletes such as Michelie Jones who won silver  McMahon only passed Jones in sight of the finish line 
The first star of the Games was 17-year-old Australian Ian Thorpe, who first set a new world record in the 400-metre freestyle final before competing in an exciting 4 × 100 m freestyle final  Swimming the last leg, Thorpe passed the leading American team and arrived in a new world record time, two-tenths of a second ahead of the Americans  In the same event for women, the Americans also broke the world record, finishing ahead of the Netherlands and Sweden 
Samaranch had to leave for home, as his wife was severely ill  Upon arrival, his wife had already died  Samaranch returned to Sydney four days later  The Olympic flag was flown at half-staff during the period as a sign of respect to Samaranch's wife 

Day 3: 17 September
Canadian Simon Whitfield sprinted away in the last 100 metres of the men's triathlon, becoming the inaugural winner in the event 
On the cycling track, Robert Bartko beat fellow German Jens Lehmann in the individual pursuit, setting a new Olympic Record  Leontien Zijlaard-van Moorsel set a world record in the semi-finals the same event for women 
In the swimming pool, American Tom Dolan beat the world record in the 400-metre medley, successfully defending the title he won in Atlanta four years prior  Dutchwoman Inge de Bruijn also clocked a new world record, beating her own time in the 100 m butterfly final to win by more than a second 

Day 4: 18 September
The main event for the Australians on the fourth day of the Games was the 200 m freestyle  Dutchman Pieter van den Hoogenband had broken the world record in the semi-finals, taking it from the new Australian hero Ian Thorpe, who came close to the world record in his semi-final heat  As the final race finished, Van den Hoogenband's time was exactly the same as in the semi-finals, finishing ahead of Thorpe by half a second 
China won the gold medal in the men's team all-around gymnastics competition after being the runner-up in the previous two Olympics  The other medals were taken by Ukraine and Russia, respectively 
Zijlaard-van Moorsel lived up to the expectations set by her world record in cycling in the semis by winning the gold medal 

Day 7: 21 September
During the Women's Gymnastics All-Around, female athletes suffered damning scores and injuries due to improperly installed gymnastics equipment  Gymnasts performing on the vault gave uncharacteristically poor performances and fell  Officials blamed the series of falls and low scores on performance anxiety  It wasn't until Australian gymnast Allana Slater and her coach, Peggy Liddick, voiced concerns about the equipment that officials discovered the apparatus was five centimetres, or almost two inches, lower than it should've been  While athletes were given the opportunity to perform again, for some of them, the damage to their mental or physical health caused by the vault was irreparable  Chinese gymnast Kui Yuanyuan and American gymnast Kristen Maloney both injured their legs while attempting to stick their landings, with Kui needing to be carried to an examination area and Maloney damaging a titanium rod that had recently been implanted in her shin  Romanian gymnast Andreea Răducan ultimately took gold while her teammates, Simona Amânar and Maria Olaru took silver and bronze, respectively 

Day 9: 23 September
By rowing in the winning coxless four, Steve Redgrave of Great Britain became a member of a select group who had won gold medals at five consecutive Olympics 
The swimming 4 x 100-metre medley relay of B J  Bedford, Megan Quann (Jendrick), Jenny Thompson and Dara Torres became the first women's relay under 4-minutes, swimming 3:58 and setting a world record, claiming the gold medal for the United States 

Day 10: 24 September
Rulon Gardner, never an NCAA champion or a world medalist, beat Alexander Karelin of Russia to win gold in the super heavyweight class, Greco-Roman wrestling  Karelin had won gold in Seoul, Barcelona and Atlanta  Before this fight, he had never lost in international competition, had been unbeaten in all competitions in 13 years, and had not surrendered a point in a decade 

Day 11: 25 September
Australian Cathy Freeman won the 400-metre final in front of a jubilant Sydney crowd at the Olympic Stadium, ahead of Lorraine Graham of Jamaica and Katharine Merry of Great Britain  Freeman's win made her the first competitor in Olympic Games history to light the Olympic Flame and then go on to win a Gold Medal  The attendance at the stadium was 112,524 – the largest attendance for any sport in Olympic Games history 
In a men's basketball pool match between the United States and France, the USA's Vince Carter made one of the most famous dunks in basketball history  After getting the ball off a steal, the 6'6"/1 98 m Carter drove to the basket, with 7'2"/2 18 m centre Frédéric Weis in his way  Carter jumped, spread his legs in midair, scraped Weis' head on the way up, and dunked  The French media dubbed the feat le dunk de la mort ("the dunk of death") 

Day 14: 28 September
The Canadian flag at the athletes' village was lowered to half-mast as Canadian athletes paid tribute to the former prime minister Pierre Trudeau after hearing of his death in Montreal (because of the time zone difference, it was 29 September in Sydney when Trudeau died)  The Canadian flag was flown at half-mast for the remainder of the Olympics, on orders from both IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch and Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy, as the state funeral did not take place until 3 October, two days after the closing ceremony, and the Canadian athletes subsequently rushed back to attend his funeral after 1 October 

Day 16: 30 September
Cameroon won a historic gold medal over Spain in the Men's Olympic Football Final at the Olympic Stadium  The game went to a penalty shootout, which was won by Cameroon 5–3 

Day 17: 1 October
The last event of the games was the Men's Marathon, contested on a course that started in North Sydney  The event was won by Ethiopian Gezahegne Abera, with Kenyan Erick Wainaina second, and Tesfaye Tola, also of Ethiopia, third  It was the first time since the 1968 Olympics that an Ethiopian won the gold medal in this event 
The closing ceremony commenced with Christine Anu performing her version of the Warumpi Band's song "My Island Home", with several Aboriginal dancers atop the Geodome Stage in the middle of the stadium, around which several hundred umbrella and lamp box kids created an image of Aboriginal Dreamtime  The Geodome Stage was used throughout the ceremony, which was a flat stage mechanically raised into the shape of a Geode 
IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch declared at the Closing Ceremony,
"I am proud and happy to proclaim that you have presented to the world the best Olympic Games ever "
Subsequent Summer Olympics held in Athens, Beijing and London have been described by Samaranch's successor Jacques Rogge as "unforgettable, dream Games", "truly exceptional" and "happy and glorious games" respectively – the practice of declaring games the "best ever" having been retired after the 2000 Games 

Sports
The 2000 Summer Olympic programme featured 300 events in the following 28 sports:

Although demonstration sports were abolished following the 1992 Summer Olympics, the Sydney Olympics featured wheelchair racing as exhibition events on the athletics schedule Special quarantine conditions were introduced to allow entry of horses into Australia to participate in equestrian events, avoiding the need for such events to take place elsewhere as had happened at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne 

Calendar
All dates are in AEDST (UTC+11); the other two cities, Adelaide uses ACST (UTC+9:30) and Brisbane uses AEST (UTC+10)

Medal count
These are the top ten nations that won medals in the 2000 Games 
The ranking in this table is based on information provided by the International Olympic Committee  Some other sources may be inconsistent due to not taking into account all later doping cases 

  *   Host nation (Australia)

Participating National Olympic Committees
199 National Olympic Committees (NOCs) participated in the Sydney Games, two more than in the 1996 Summer Olympics; in addition, there were four Timorese Individual Olympic Athletes at the 2000 Summer Olympics  Eritrea, the Federated States of Micronesia and Palau made their Olympic debut this year 
Democratic Republic of the Congo was once again designated under that name, after it participated as Zaire from 1984 to 1996 
Afghanistan was the only 1996 participant (and the only existing NOC) that did not participate in the 2000 Olympics, having been banned due to the Taliban's totalitarian rule in Afghanistan, their oppression of women, and its prohibition of sports 

Venues
Sydney Olympic Park
Stadium Australia: Ceremonies (opening/closing), Athletics, Football (final)
Sydney International Aquatic Centre: Diving, Modern Pentathlon (swimming) Swimming, Synchronised Swimming, Water Polo (medal events)
State Sports Centre: Table Tennis, Taekwondo
NSW Tennis Centre: Tennis
State Hockey Centre: Field Hockey
The Dome and Exhibition Complex: Badminton, Basketball, Gymnastics (rhythmic), Handball (final), Modern Pentathlon (fencing, shooting), Volleyball (indoor)
Sydney SuperDome: Gymnastics (artistic, trampoline), Basketball (final)
Sydney Baseball Stadium: Baseball, Modern Pentathlon (riding, running)
Sydney International Archery Park: Archery

Sydney
Sydney Convention & Exhibition Centre: Boxing, Fencing, Judo, Weightlifting, Wrestling
Sydney Entertainment Centre: Volleyball (indoor final)
Dunc Gray Velodrome: Cycling (track)
Sydney International Shooting Centre: Shooting
Sydney International Equestrian Centre: Equestrian
Sydney International Regatta Centre: Rowing, Canoeing (sprint)
Blacktown Olympic Centre: Baseball, Softball
Western Sydney Parklands: Cycling (mountain biking)
Ryde Aquatic Leisure Centre: Water Polo
Penrith Whitewater Stadium: Canoeing (slalom)
Bondi Beach: Volleyball (beach)
Sydney Football Stadium: Football
Olympic Sailing Shore Base: Sailing
Centennial Parklands: Cycling (road)
Marathon course: Athletics (marathon)
North Sydney: Athletics (marathon start)
Sydney Opera House: Triathlon 

Outside Sydney
Canberra Stadium, Canberra: Football
Hindmarsh Stadium, Adelaide: Football
Melbourne Cricket Ground: Football
The Gabba (Brisbane Cricket Ground), Brisbane: Football

Organization
Organisations responsible for the Olympics
A number of quasi-government bodies were responsible for the construction, organisation and execution of the Sydney Games  These included:

the Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (SOCOG) and the Sydney Paralympic Organizing Committee (SPOC), primarily responsibles for the staging of the Games
Olympic Coordination Authority (OCA), primarily responsible for construction and oversight
Olympic Roads & Transport Authority (ORTA)
Olympic Security Command Centre (OSCC)
Olympic Intelligence Centre (OIC)
JTF Gold the Australian Defence Force Joint Taskforce Gold
Sydney Olympic Broadcasting Organisation (nominally part of SOCOG)
IBM, provider of technology and the Technical Command Centre
Telstra, provider of telecommunications
Great Big Events, event management and marketingThese organisations worked closely together and with other bodies such as:

the International Olympic Committee (IOC)
the International Paralympic Committee (IPC)
the Australian Olympic Committee (AOC)
the Australian Paralympic Committee (APC)
the other 197 National Olympic Committees (NOCs)
the other 125 National Paralympic Committees (NPCs)
the 33 International Sports Federations (IFs)
all three levels of Australian government (federal, state and local)
dozens of official sponsor and hundreds of official supplier companiesThese bodies are often collectively referred to as the "Olympic Family" 

Organisation of the Paralympics
The organisation of the 2000 Summer Paralympics was the responsibility of the Sydney Paralympic Organising Committee (SPOC)  However, much of the planning and operation of the Paralympic Games was outsourced to SOCOG such that most operational programmes planned both the Olympic and Paralympic Games 

Other Olympic events
The organisation of the Games included not only the actual sporting events, but also the management (and sometimes construction) of the sporting venues and surrounding precincts, the organisation of the Sydney Olympic Arts Festival, and the Olympic torch relay, which began in Greece and travelled to Australia via numerous Oceania island nations 

Phases of the Olympic project
The staging of the Olympics were treated as a project on a vast scale, broken into several broad phases:

1993 to 1996 – positioning
1997 – going operational
1998 – procurement/venuisation
1999 – testing/refinement
2000 – implementation
2001 – post-implementation and wind-down

SOCOG organisational design
The internal organisation of SOCOG evolved over the phases of the project and changed, sometimes radically, several times 
In late 1998, the design was principally functional  The top two tiers below the CEO Sandy Hollway consisted of five groups (managed by Group General Managers and the Deputy CEO) and twenty divisions (managed by divisional General Managers), which in turn were further broken up into programmes and sub-programmes or projects 
In 1999, functional areas (FAs) broke up into geographic precinct and venue teams (managed by Precinct Managers and Venue Managers) with functional area staff reporting to both the FA manager and the venue manager  SOCOG moved to a matrix structure  The Interstate Football division extant in 1998 was the first of these geographically based venue teams 

Volunteer program
The origins of the volunteer program for Sydney 2000 dates back to the bid, as early as 1992 
On 17 December 1992, a group of Sydney citizens interested in the prospect of hosting the 2000 Olympic and Paralympic Games gathered for a meeting at Sports House at Wentworth Park in Sydney 
In the period leading up to 1999, after Sydney had won the bid, the small group of volunteers grew from approximately 42 to around 500  These volunteers became known as Pioneer Volunteers  The Pioneer Volunteer program was managed internally by SOCOG's Volunteer Services Department in consultation with prominent peak groups like The Centre for Volunteering (Volunteering and TAFE  Some of the Pioneer Volunteers still meet every four months, an unseen legacy of the games which brought together a community spirit not seen before 
During the Olympic games, tens of thousands of volunteers (the official figure placed at 46,967) helped everywhere at the Olympic venues and elsewhere in the city  They were honoured with a parade like the athletes had a few days before 

Marketing
Official logo
The bid logo was introduced in 1992 and created by architect and designer Michael Bryce  It featured a colourful, stylised image of the Sydney Opera House which is a possible reference to the motif of the rainbow serpent  
The official logo was revealed in 1996, and is also referred to as the "Millennium Man"   It incorporated similar curves to the bid logo and combined them with a stylised image of a runner to form a torchbearer in motion  The image of the runner s composed of  two small yellow boomerangs for arms and a larger red boomerang for legs  Over the runner's head is a trail of smoke that represents the arches of the Sydney Opera House The design process of the official logo, as well as all other aspects of the Olympic Games' visual design identity, was awarded to Melbourne design studio FHA Image Design  The Sydney Olympics brand identity project officially started in 1993, and lasted 7 years  It was also up to FHA Design to prepare the visual identity of the Paralympic Games and this also absorbed some elements as the identification signals and the pictograms 

Mascots
The official mascots chosen for the 2000 Summer Olympics were Syd the platypus, Millie the echidna, and Olly the kookaburra, designed by Matthew Hattan and Jozef Szekeres and named by Philip Sheldon of agency Weekes Morris Osborn in response to the original SOCOG recommendation of Murray, Margery, and Dawn after famous Australian athletes 
There was also Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat, an unofficial mascot popularised by comedy team Roy Slaven and HG Nelson on the TV series The Dream with Roy and HG  Roy and HG also frequently disparaged the official mascots on their television program 

Sponsors
Medals and bouquets
A total of 750 gold, 750 silver and 780 bronze medals were minted for the Games  The gold and silver medals contained 99 99 percent of pure silver  The bronze medals were 99 percent bronze with one percent silver, they were made by melting down Australian one-cent and two-cent coins, which had been removed from circulation from 1992 onward 
The bouquets handed to medal recipients incorporated foliage from the Grevillea baileyana, also known as the white oak 

Awards and commendations
The International Olympic Committee awarded Sydney and its inhabitants with the "Pierre de Coubertin Trophy" in recognition of the collaboration and happiness shown by the people of Sydney during the event to all the athletes and visitors around the world After the games' end, the New South Wales Police Force was granted use of the Olympic Rings in a new commendation and citation as the IOC consideration after having staged the "safest" games ever 

Mo Awards
The Australian Entertainment Mo Awards (commonly known informally as the Mo Awards), were annual Australian entertainment industry awards  They recognise achievements in live entertainment in Australia from 1975 to 2016 

In popular culture
In F J  Campbell's 2018 novel No Number Nine, the last part of the book is set at the Sydney 2000 Olympics In Tom Clancy's thriller Rainbow Six and its video game adaptation, the 2000 Olympic Games are the setting of a plot by eco-terrorists, who plan to use the games in order to spread a terrible new plague throughout the world In Morris Gleitzman's children's book Toad Rage, a cane toad travels to Sydney in a bid to become the Olympic mascot The Games was a mockumentary television series run on the ABC network, with two seasons that ran in 1998 and 2000  The series satirized corruption and cronyism in the Olympic movement, bureaucratic ineptness in the New South Wales public service, and unethical behaviour within politics and the media  An unusual feature of the show was that the characters shared the same name as the actors who played them 

See also
2000 Summer Paralympics
Olympic Games celebrated in Australia
1956 Summer Olympics – Melbourne
2000 Summer Olympics – Sydney
2032 Summer Olympics – BrisbaneList of IOC country codes
The Games of the XXVII Olympiad 2000: Music from the Opening Ceremony
Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi
John Coates
Use of performance-enhancing drugs in the Olympic Games – Sydney 2000

Notes
Passage 7:
List of Olympic Games host cities
This is a list of host cities of the Olympic Games, both summer and winter, since the modern Olympics began in 1896  Since then, summer and winter games have usually celebrated a four-year period known as an Olympiad; summer and winter games normally held in staggered even years  There have been 29  Summer Olympic Games held in 21 cities, and 24 Winter Olympic Games held in 21 cities  In addition, three summer and two winter editions of the games were scheduled to take place but later cancelled due to war: Berlin (summer) in 1916; Sapporo–Garmisch-Partenkirchen (winter) and Tokyo–Helsinki (summer) in 1940; and Cortina d'Ampezzo (winter) and London (summer) in 1944  The 1906 Intercalated Olympics were officially sanctioned and held in Athens  However, in 1949, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to unrecognize the 1906 Games  The 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo were postponed for the first time in the Olympics history to summer 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic with the 2022 Winter Olympics being held roughly six months later in Beijing Four cities have been chosen by the IOC to host upcoming Olympic Games: Paris for the 2024 Summer Olympics, Milan–Cortina d'Ampezzo for the 2026 Winter Olympics, Los Angeles for the 2028 Summer Olympics, and Brisbane for the 2032 Summer Olympics 
In 2022, Beijing became the first city that has held both the summer and the winter Olympic Games  Ten cities will have hosted the Olympic Games more than once: Athens (1896 and 2004 Summer Olympics), Paris (1900, 1924 and 2024 Summer Olympics), London (1908, 1948 and 2012 Summer Olympics), St  Moritz (1928 and 1948 Winter Olympics), Lake Placid (1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics), Los Angeles (1932, 1984 and 2028 Summer Olympics), Cortina d'Ampezzo (1956 and 2026 Winter Olympics), Innsbruck (1964 and 1976 Winter Olympics), Tokyo (1964 and 2020 Summer Olympics) and Beijing (2008 Summer Olympics and 2022 Winter Olympics)  Stockholm hosted the 1912 Summer Olympics and the equestrian portion of the 1956 Summer Olympics  London became the first city to have hosted three Games with the 2012 Summer Olympics  Paris will become the second city to do this with the 2024 Summer Olympics, followed by Los Angeles as the third in 2028 
The Games have primarily been hosted in the regions of Europe (30 editions) and the Americas (13 editions); eight Games have been hosted in Asia and two have been hosted in Oceania  Rio de Janeiro became South America's first Olympic host city with the 2016 Summer Olympics  Africa has yet to host an Olympic Games  Other major geographic regions which have never hosted the Olympics include the Middle East, Central Asia, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, the South Pacific, Central America and the Caribbean  Between the first Winter Olympics in 1924 and the last ones to be held in the same year as the Summer Olympics in 1992, the Summer and Winter games took place in the same country three times 
Host cities are selected by the IOC membership, usually seven years in advance  The selection process lasts approximately two years  In the first stage, any city in the world may submit an application to become a host city  After 10 months, the Executive Board of the IOC decides which applicant cities will become official candidates as based on the recommendation of a working group that reviews the applications  In a second stage, the candidate cities are investigated thoroughly by an Evaluation Commission, which then submits a final short list of cities to be considered for selection  The host city is then chosen by vote of the IOC session, a general meeting of IOC members 

Olympic Games host cities
Host cities for Summer and Winter Olympic Games
Key  †   Cancelled
  §   Postponed

The 1906 Intercalated Games are no longer officially recognized by the IOC as an official Olympic Games 

Host cities for multiple Summer and Winter Olympic Games
Number of Olympic Games by country
Number of Olympic Games by region
See also
List of bids for the Summer Olympics
List of bids for the Winter Olympics

Notes
Passage 8:
Jelle Nijdam
Jelle Nijdam (born 16 August 1963) is a Dutch former professional road cyclist  Nijdam turned professional after the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles  He participated in the Tour de France 10 times, winning six stages and wearing the yellow jersey for three days  Nijdam's father, Henk Nijdam, was a professional cyclist from 1962 to 1969, who won the 1962 world amateur track pursuit championship  He also competed in the individual pursuit and team pursuit events at the 1984 Summer Olympics 

Career achievements
Major results
Grand Tour general classification results timeline
See also
List of Dutch Olympic cyclists
List of Dutch cyclists who have led the Tour de France general classification
Passage 9:
Kuwait national under-23 football team
The Kuwait national under-23 football team is the youth association football team representing Kuwait in youth competitions and it is controlled by Kuwait Football Association  Kuwait under 23 Could also be called as Kuwait Olympic Team  Kuwait under 23 also represents its country in the Olympic Games  From 1900 to 1976 Kuwait did not qualify for the Olympic Games but in 1980 Kuwait qualified for the Olympic Games in China and had the best record of their country finishing in the quarter-finals of that Olympic games  Kuwait missed the 1984 and 1988 Olympic games  But in 1992 Kuwait finally qualified for the 1992 Olympic Games in Spain, however with their poor performance, Kuwait was eliminated in the first round of that tournament  After that Kuwait had missed the 1996 Olympic Games that was hosted by the United States, Kuwait then qualified for the 2000 Olympic Games in Australia and that was the last time Kuwait qualified for the Olympic Games  Kuwait has never won the GCC U-23 Championship but their best finish at that Competition was as a runner up in 2010  In the 2022 Asian U-23 qualification Cup Group D, Kuwait managed to defeat Bangladesh by 1-0 and Saudi Arabia by 2-1, this resulted in Kuwait to qualify for the 2022 Asian U-23 Cup 

Honours
Regional honours
GCC U-23 ChampionshipRunners-up (2): 2010, 2015

Minor
2018 Olympic Return Cup

History
Kuwait’s first-ever qualification to the Olympic games was in the 1980 Olympic Games which Kuwait were eliminated in the quarter-finals of that Olympic games  Kuwait missed the 1984 Olympic Games and the 1988 Olympic Games  Kuwait came back to the Olympic Games in 1992 after missing two events being eliminated in the quarter-final of that event  Kuwait did not qualify until the 2000 Olympic Games and that was the last time Kuwait qualified for the Olympic games  Kuwait did not qualify to the Olympic Games in 2004 after being eliminated in the qualifying Preliminary round 3 of the Football at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Qualifiers at the third position of the 3rd group  Kuwait was unqualified from Football at the 2008 Summer Olympics – Qualifier, with 2 being 4 goals less than Qatar due to that, Kuwait missed the 2008 Olympic Games  Kuwait also failed to participate in the 2012 Olympic Games after losing Football at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Qualifiers, within losing the first leg to Japan 3-1 but then Kuwait defeated Japan 2-1, Japan won on the aggregate 
Kuwait does not have a good record at GCC U-23 Championship after finishing 5th in the final group of the 2008 GCC U-23 Championship 
Kuwait was at the bottom of the table at that time  In 2010 Kuwait was the runner-up of their group  Kuwait was qualified for the semi-finals, Kuwait defeated Oman 5-4 on penalties  But lost to UAE  In the 2011 and 2012 GCC U-23 Championship, Kuwait was unfortunately eliminated in the first round with 0 points losing all three games 

Participation in Tournaments


=== Summer Olympics ===
Passage 10:
Sara Symington
Sara Symington (born 25 September 1969) is a female English former professional cyclist 

Cycling career
She was the first British female rider to take a medal in a World Cup race, which she achieved in Australia in 1999  She represented Great Britain at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics and England at the 1998 Commonwealth Games and 2002 Commonwealth Games  She also rode at the 1998, 1999, and 2000 UCI Road World Championships and on the track at the 2001 and 2002 UCI Track Cycling World Championships 

Personal life
Symington was born in Maracaibo, Venezuela, lived in Aylestone and she now lives in Nottingham  She had competed as a javelin thrower as a junior, and she was a member of the national triathlon team prior to becoming a full-time cyclist  Symington started her elite triathlon career whilst combining studying for a master's degree with a spell serving in the police, having previously graduated from Loughborough University with a degree in sports science 

Post cycling
Symington retired from competition after the 2004 Olympics: following this she worked in business for two years, before returning to the sports world through working as a performance advisor for UK Sport  She was subsequently appointed performance director of Archery GB in February 2009  In February 2015 England Netball announced that she would join them as their performance director the following month  In that role she helped the England national netball team to its first Commonwealth gold medal at the 2018 Commonwealth Games  In August 2020 Symington was appointed by UK Athletics as their performance director  She left this role in October 2021 in order to take up an appointment as head of British Cycling's Olympic and Paralympic programmes 

Palmarès



ground_truth: IK Start

prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Where is the host of the American survival skills reality show, The Island, originally from?

The following are given passages.
Context 4: Passage 1:
Kristof Konrad
Kristof Konrad (born Krzysztof Wojslaw, April 26, 1962) is a Polish-American film, television, theatre, and voice actor, acting coach, voice coach, movement specialist and the Alexander Technique teacher  For over twenty years, he has successfully worked in film and television in both the United States and Europe, working with directors such as Kenneth Branagh, Francis Lawrence, Ron Howard, and Roland Emmerich and working opposite actors such as Jennifer Lawrence, Robin Wright, Kerry Washington, Jennifer Garner, and many more  He currently resides in Los Angeles and works internationally 

Early life
Kristof Konrad (birth name Krzysztof Wojsław) was born on April 26, 1962, in Gizycko, Poland  His father, Mieczyslaw, was a working-class man, and his mother, Jadwiga, a school teacher  He studied to become an electrical engineer, but at the age of 23, he decided to pursue a career in acting  For the next two years (1985-1987), Konrad attended the Alexander Zelwerowicz National Dramatic Academy in Warsaw, Poland  While there, he studied and worked with theatre and film masters Jerzy Grotowski and Andrzej Wajda  Upon graduating, he moved to Rome, Italy, where he studied with Alessandro Fersen at The Fersen Studio until 1992 

Career
Acting
After studying and working in Europe for seven years, Konrad moved to Hollywood in 1992  For over twenty years, he has successfully worked in film and television in the United States and Europe  He began his film career with a role in Independence Day directed by Roland Emmerich, followed by roles in Hotel California, Angels & Demons, Chernobyl Diaries, and many more  Some of his television credits include: Scorpion, Zoo, Agents of S H I E L D , House of Cards, Scandal, Nikita, Alias, and many more Konrad appeared as Dimitri Ustinov, opposite Jennifer Lawrence, in the spy thriller Red Sparrow (2018), directed by Francis Lawrence and based on Jason Matthews' book of the same name  It follows Dominika Egorova (Lawrence), a Russian intelligence rookie who is assigned to seduce a CIA officer; she later falls in love with the officer and considers being a double agent Konrad will play Igor Zavarov in the upcoming Il ragazzo invisibile - Seconda generazione 

Movement specialist and acting coach
Early in his career, Konrad discovered the Alexander Technique while working in the U S  He was fascinated by its "effectiveness in improving the level of acting and helping one cope with the stresses of performing and everyday life " He spent three years training as an Alexander Technique teacher with Jean-Louis Rodrigue and many others at Alexander Training Institute of Los Angeles, where he also received his certification Konrad has taught for the Berlin International Film Festival, Verbier Festival & Academy in Switzerland, and the UBS Verbier Junior Orchestra  He teaches acting in Film and Alexander Technique Intensive Workshops in New York, Los Angeles, Milan, Berlin, Toronto, and Vancouver  He collaborates with Jean-Louis Rodrigue at the Larry Moss Studio, Howard Fine Acting Studio, UCLA Extension Entertainment Studies, Theatricum Botanicum, and Media Access Konrad worked with the cast of King Lear and The Seagull of The Royal Shakespeare Company; helped Sharon Lawrence to create Vivien Leigh in Orson's Shadow at the Pasadena Playhouse; worked with the cast of Electricidad at the Mark Taper Forum, and worked with the artists of Cirque du Soleil’s Ka on improving performance and preventing injuries Konrad coached Lymari Nadal in embodying Eva, the love interest of Denzel Washington in American Gangster 

Filmography (selection)
Film
Television
Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (one episode, 1995) - Chip Off The Old Clark as Rebel Leader
High Incident (one episode, 1996) - Christmas Blues as Kronsky
JAG (one episode, 1997) -  Cowboys & Cossacks as Russian Communications Officer
Beverly Hills, 90210 (one episode, 1998) - The Fundamental Things Apply as Alex Veselic
Ryan Caulfield: Year One (one episode, 1999) - Sex and St  Michael as Lako
V I P  (one episode, 2001) - A I  Highrise as Vanderwall
Son of the Beach (one episode, 2001) - From Russia, with Johnson as Sergei
The Agency (one episode, 2001) - Deadline as Major
Alias (two episodes, 2002) - The Box: Part 1 and The Box: Part 2 as Endo
The District (one episode, 2004) - On Guard as Gregor Bukantz
E-Ring (one episode, 2006) - War Crimes as Ivan
Gilmore Girls (one episode, 2007) - I'm a Kayak, Hear Me Roar as Stefan
The Unit (one episode, 2007) - Bedfellows as Customer One
Raising the Bar (one episode, 2008) - Bagels and Locks as Andrei Markova
Burn Notice (one episode, 2009) - Friends Like These as Milovan Dragas
Gigantic (one episode, 2010) - Pilot: Part 2 as Gustav
Nikita (one episode, 2010) - 2: 2 0 as Mirko Dadich
Undercovers (one episode, 2010) - Crashed as Borz
Scandal (one episode, 2012) - Sweet Baby as Polish Ambassador
Intelligence (one episode, 2014) - The Grey Hat as Torbin Salvi
House of Cards (one episode, 2015) - Chapter 32 as Boris Litsky
Agents of S H I E L D  (one episode, 2016) - Parting Shot as General Androvich
Zoo (two episodes, 2016) - The Contingency & The Yellow Brick Road as Leonid Ivankov
Scorpion (one episode, 2017) – Episode #4 2 as Manager Anton Eksteritsky
Homecoming (two episodes, 2018) -Episode #1 2 and Episode 1 10 as Mr  Heidl
I Am the Night (one episode, 2019) - "Episode #1 6" as Rachmaninoff
FBI: Most Wanted (one episode, 2022) - A Man Without a Country as Aleksander Pavlishchev
Chicago Med (four episodes, 2023) as Pawel Wapniarski
Passage 2:
Justin Timberlake videography
American entertainer Justin Timberlake has released four video albums and has been featured in thirty-seven music videos, seventeen films, fifteen television shows, and six commercials  He achieved early fame when he appeared in the Disney Channel television series The All-New Mickey Mouse Club, alongside singers Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera and actor Ryan Gosling  Timberlake rose to fame in the late 1990s as the lead singer of the boy band NSYNC  In 2002, he launched his solo career and released his solo debut single "Like I Love You", the music video for which was directed by Bucky Chrome  Francis Lawrence directed the video for "Cry Me a River"  The video features Timberlake's character as he spies on a former lover, who according to the director portrays his former romantic interest Spears  At the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards, the video won the accolades for Best Male Video and Best Pop Video In 2005, Timberlake starred in the thriller Edison alongside Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey  The film received negative reviews from film critics and was a box office bomb  He then portrayed Frankie Ballenbacher in the crime drama Alpha Dog (2006); it received mixed responses from critics and attained box office success  The same year, Timberlake released his second studio album FutureSex/LoveSounds—four music videos for singles from the album were shot  Samuel Bayer directed the music video for "What Goes Around    Comes Around" (2007) in which American actress Scarlett Johansson plays Timberlake's love interest  From 2007 until 2009, he appeared in the music videos for his collaborations with other artists including 50 Cent ("Ayo Technology"), Madonna ("4 Minutes") and T I  ("Dead and Gone") 
Timberlake starred in the 2010 drama The Social Network, in which he portrayed Sean Parker, the first president of Facebook  The film received acclaim from critics and was a box office success  In 2011, he starred in the comedies Bad Teacher and Friends with Benefits alongside Cameron Diaz and Mila Kunis respectively  Both films were financial successes  The music videos for his songs "Mirrors" and "Suit & Tie" were released in 2013  They earned him a MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year and a Grammy Award for Best Music Video, respectively  Timberlake has also hosted Saturday Night Live five times, being both host and musical guest three times  In film, he released Justin Timberlake + The Tennessee Kids and voiced Branch in Trolls (2016) as well as its sequel Trolls World Tour (2020) 

Music videos
As a performer
Guest appearances
Video albums
Filmography
Film
Television
Commercials
Notes
Passage 3:
Rich Lee
Richard "Rich" Lee is an American music video and commercial director  He has directed music videos for Eminem, Lana Del Rey, Maroon 5, The Black Eyed Peas, Norah Jones, Michael Bublé and The All-American Rejects  Rich Lee started his professional career as a sculptor and fabricator for Broadway shows in New York City  He later moved on to computer graphics and created 3-D previsualizations for big budget Hollywood feature films such as the first three Pirates of the Caribbean films, I Am Legend, Minority Report and Constantine  From the encouragement of feature film directors he moved into directing music videos and commercials  He has directed commercials for brands like Fiat, Hyundai, Honda, Beats by Dre etc 

Videography
Television
NotesA  – Directed with Marc Webb 
B  – Skylar Grey does not appear in the music video 
C  – "Imma Be" and "Rock That Body" combined into one video 
D  - Video currently in production 
Passage 4:
What's So Different?
"What's So Different?" is a song by American R&B singer Ginuwine  It was co-written and produced by Timbaland for his second album 100% Ginuwine (1999)  The song is built around a sample of "Valleri" (1968) by American band The Monkees  Due to the inclusion of the sample, Thomas Boyce and Bobby Hart are also credited as songwriters  Released as the album's second single, "What's So Different?" reached the top ten of the UK Singles Chart and entered the top twenty in New Zealand  It the United States, the song peaked at number three on the Rhythmic chart, also reaching number 21 on the US Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs 

Lyrical content and music video
"What's So Different" lyrically describes the narrator questioning his lover who is cheating on her boyfriend to be with him  He claims that if she is cheating on another man to be with him, she may also cheat on him to be with someone else  The music video was directed by Francis Lawrence  "What's So Different" samples the Monkees' 1968 hit "Valleri" 

Track listing
Notes

^a  denotes additional producerSample credits

"What's So Different?" contains an interpolation of "Valleri" (1968) as performed by The Monkees 

Credits and personnel
Credits lifted from the liner notes of 100% Ginuwine 
Thomas Boyce – writer (sample)
Bobby Hart – writer (sample)
Ginuwine – vocals, writer
Timbaland – producer, writer

Charts
Passage 5:
Constantine (film)
Constantine is a 2005 American superhero horror film directed by Francis Lawrence in his directorial debut  Written by Kevin Brodbin and Frank Cappello from a story by Brodbin, it is loosely based on the DC Comics/Vertigo Comics Hellblazer graphic novels  The film stars Keanu Reeves as John Constantine, a cynical exorcist with the ability to perceive and communicate with half-angels and half-demons in their true forms and to travel between Earth and Hell  Rachel Weisz, Shia LaBeouf, Tilda Swinton, Pruitt Taylor Vince, Djimon Hounsou, Gavin Rossdale, and Peter Stormare also feature 
Constantine was released theatrically in the United States on February 18, 2005  It grossed $230 9 million worldwide against a production budget between $70–100 million, but met with a mixed reception from film critics  In the following years, it has been considered as a cult film  In 2022, a sequel was announced and is currently in development 

Plot
In Mexico, a scavenger recovers the tip of the spear that pierced Jesus Christ from a ruined church and, after becoming possessed, takes it to Los Angeles  There, cynical occult expert John Constantine exorcises a demon from a young girl after witnessing its attempt to come through her to Earth, something that should be impossible because of a treaty between Heaven and Hell  Suffering from terminal lung cancer, Constantine meets with the half-breed angel Gabriel to request an extension to his life in exchange for his work deporting Hell's forces  Gabriel responds that performing good deeds for selfish reasons will not secure his way into Heaven 
Elsewhere, detective Angela Dodson is investigating the death of her twin sister Isabel who leaped from a psychiatric hospital roof  Angela refuses to believe her sister, a devout Catholic, would commit suicide and condemn herself to Hell  Watching security footage, Angela hears Isabel say "Constantine", and seeks out his assistance  He refuses to help until he witnesses demons pursuing Angela and fends them off  He uses a ritual to see Isabel in Hell and confirms she killed herself  Constantine tells Angela that he committed suicide as a teenager because he was traumatized by seeing supernatural creatures and, though he was revived, when he dies he is condemned to Hell 
At the morgue, Constantine's friend Father Hennesy discovers a symbol on Isabel's wrist but is killed by the half-breed demon Balthazar  Constantine and Angela discover Hennesy carved the symbol into his hand for them to find  Angela also finds a clue hidden in Isabel's hospital room concerning a chapter of Hell's bible  Before being killed by Balthazar, Constantine's ally Beeman tells the pair the symbol represents the antichrist Mammon, Lucifer's son, and the chapter prophesies him usurping his father and conquering the Earth, using a powerful psychic and divine assistance; the psychic, Isabel, killed herself to stop Mammon  Angela reveals she possessed powers like Isabel's but repressed them to avoid being deemed insane like her sister  Constantine helps Angela reawaken her powers by inducing a near-death experience, and she uses them to find Balthazar 
Constantine interrogates Balthazar and learns that the blood of Christ on the spear tip is Mammon's divine assistance, and Angela has been chosen as his new host  An unseen entity destroys Balthazar and abducts Angela who becomes possessed by Mammon  With the help of witch doctor Papa Midnite, Constantine induces visions to locate Angela at the psychiatric hospital  Alongside his driver and apprentice, Chas Kramer, Constantine arms himself and assaults the building, battling through hordes of demons to Angela  Constantine and Chas seemingly exorcise Mammon from her, but Chas is killed by the unseen force, revealed to be Gabriel  Resentful at God's favoritism for humanity and forgiveness for even the most wicked, Gabriel intends to unleash Hell on Earth so that those who survive will become truly "worthy" of His love  Gabriel tosses Constantine away and prepares to pierce Angela with the spear tip to unleash Mammon 
Desperate, Constantine commits suicide by slitting his wrists, knowing that Lucifer will personally come to collect him  Time pauses and Constantine convinces Lucifer to intervene and stop Mammon  Gabriel ineffectually attempts to smite Lucifer, revealing God has abandoned them, and Lucifer burns away Gabriel's wings before banishing Mammon to Hell  Lucifer offers to restore Constantine to life for his assistance, but he instead asks that Isabel be sent to Heaven  Lucifer releases Isabel, but Constantine begins ascending to Heaven for his selfless sacrifice  Infuriated, Lucifer restores Constantine to life and removes his cancer, believing that, in time, he will prove he belongs in Hell  Constantine punches the now-mortal Gabriel before leaving and entrusts Angela with securing the spear tip  In a post-credits scene, Constantine visits Chas's grave and witnesses Chas in an angelic form 

Cast
Keanu Reeves as John Constantine: A chain-smoking cynic with the ability to perceive the true visage of half-angels and half-demons on the human plane  John believes himself damned to Hell for attempting suicide—a mortal sin—and has terminal lung cancer 
Connor Dylan Wryn as young John Constantine
Quinn Buniel as child John Constantine
Rachel Weisz as Angela Dodson: A troubled LAPD detective investigating the suicide of her twin sister Isabel (also portrayed by Weisz) 
Weisz also portrays Mammon, the son of Lucifer who has no patience for his father's rule of Hell and uses Angela's body as a means of escaping to rule over Earth 
Shia LaBeouf as Chas Kramer: Constantine's driver and apprentice  Chas has a strong interest in the occult and helps Constantine whenever possible in order to gain knowledge and experience from him 
Tilda Swinton as Gabriel: A "half-breed" Archangel with a disdain for humanity who plots to free Mammon as a means to unleash Hell on the Earth 
Pruitt Taylor Vince as Father Hennessy: An insomniac, alcoholic priest with the ability to communicate with the dead  He wears a protective charm in order to "keep the voices out" 
Djimon Hounsou as Papa Midnite: A former witch-doctor who once fought against Hell  After swearing an oath of neutrality—unless one side should tip the balance of power—he opened a nightclub to serve as neutral meeting ground for both sides of the war between Heaven and Hell 
Gavin Rossdale as Balthazar: A "half-breed" demon with a special interest in, and personal history with, Constantine 
Peter Stormare as Lucifer: A fallen Archangel who is in a proxy war with God for the souls of all mankind and ruler of Hell, feared on Earth as Satan or The Devil  Lucifer loathes Constantine with such vigor that Constantine's soul is the only one he would ever come to personally collect 
Max Baker as Beeman: A friend of Constantine's with extensive knowledge of exotic occult materials and insects  He supplies Constantine with both holy objects and information 
Francis Guinan as Father Garret: A priest Angela talks to about getting Isabel a Catholic burial 
José Zúñiga as Det  Weiss: Angela's partner 
Jesse Ramirez as Manuel: A scavenger and treasure hunter who finds the Spear of Destiny in the ruins of a church in Mexico that grants various powers and places him in a trance-like state in which he travels to Los Angeles 
April Grace as Dr  Archer: Constantine's doctor 
Tanoai Reed as the bouncer at Midnite's club Additionally, Michelle Monaghan filmed several scenes as Ellie, a half-breed demon Constantine sleeps with and asks for information, who is based on a succubus of the same name in the Hellblazer comics  In the finished film, however, the role consists of two brief shots and one line of dialogue ("Holy water?") during Constantine's climactic confrontation with the group of half-breeds in the hospital  Director Francis Lawrence said Ellie's relationship with Constantine was cut to make him more of a lonely character 

Production
The character of John Constantine was introduced by comic book writer/creator Alan Moore in The Saga of Swamp Thing #37, released in June 1985  In 1988, the character was given his own comic book title, Hellblazer, published by DC Comics 
Producer Lauren Shuler Donner began developing the film in 1997  Paul Hunter was attached to direct in 1999, and he was replaced by Tarsem Singh in 2001  Warner Bros  hoped to begin filming in 2002 with Nicolas Cage in the lead role, but Singh dropped out, resulting in opposing lawsuits filed by himself and Warner Bros  Keanu Reeves became attached to the film in 2002  Alan Moore, the original creator of John Constantine, was disappointed by the previous adaptations of his comics From Hell and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and refused to be credited or associated with this film, asking that his royalties be distributed among the other creators of the character 
Constantine incorporated some elements of Garth Ennis's "Dangerous Habits" story arc from the comic (issues #41–46), and others, such as the inclusion of Papa Midnite, from the Original Sins trade paperback  The film's title was changed from Hellblazer to Constantine to avoid confusion with Clive Barker's Hellraiser films  In fact, the comic series was originally going to be titled Hellraiser, but was also retitled to avoid confusion with the first Hellraiser film, which was released a year before the debut of Hellblazer The film changed several aspects of the source material  For one, it was set in Los Angeles, rather than England, which director Francis Lawrence justified by claiming that the comic book was not exclusively set in London  Reeves played the role of John Constantine with his real-life American accent and black hair, while the character in the comics was drawn to resemble the blond musician Sting and came from Liverpool  For the film, Constantine was also given the psychic ability to see "half-breeds" as they truly are, and this led him to attempt suicide, causing his damnation, which, in the comics, was punishment for summoning a demon that killed a young girl  Additionally, the resolution of the lung cancer plotline in the film was amended so that Lucifer willingly saves the redeemed Constantine to give him a second chance at falling, rather than being tricked into doing so 
Director Lawrence decided to base the film's conception of Hell "on the geography of what's around us now"  He further explained:

That was actually a combination of me and the visual effects supervisor and the production designer sitting down and sort of coming up with the biological growth that's growing all over the cars and what that looks like and the color palette  And we started to look at the nuclear test films from the 1940s of the nuclear blasts and just decided that it would be great if the landscape was not only violent with these creatures, but also the atmosphere  So we decided that it was kind of an eternal nuclear blast except nothing ever really gets obliterated because it's eternal and it's constantly going 

Music
Soundtrack
Constantine: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack was released on February 15, 2005  It is an orchestral compilation of songs from the film, performed by The Hollywood Studio Symphony & The Hollywood Film Chorale and composed by Brian Tyler, the composer for films such as Eagle Eye and Fast & Furious, and Klaus Badelt  Two songs heard in the film, "Passive" by A Perfect Circle (heard as Constantine walks through Midnite's bar) and "Take Five" by The Dave Brubeck Quartet (heard on a record played by Constantine), were not included on the soundtrack 
The album was panned by Allmusic, who referred to it as "clichéd and religiously formulaic" 

Release
Theatrical
The original release date for the film was September 17, 2004, but was subsequently pushed back to February 2005  Although the film was intended to be rated PG-13, it received an R-rating from the MPAA, which Lawrence attributed to its religious overtones 

Home media
The film was released on VHS and DVD in 2005  Warner Home Video intended to release the film on HD DVD on March 28, 2006, making it one of the earliest titles released on that media format, but, following delays to the launch of HD DVD, it actually debuted on June 6 the same year  It was released on Blu-ray Disc by Warner Home Video on October 14, 2008 

Reception
Box office
Constantine opened in 3,006 theaters in the United States on February 18, 2005, earning $29 8 million in its opening weekend and ranking second behind Hitch's second weekend  It ended its run on June 16, having grossed $76 million in the United States and Canada, and $154 9 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $230 9 million, against a production budget of $70–100 million 

Critical response
On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 46% based on the reviews of 230 critics, and an average rating of 5 5/10; the site's consensus states: "Despite solid production values and an intriguing premise, Constantine lacks the focus of another spiritual shoot-em-up, The Matrix"  On Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average, it has a score of 50 out of 100 based on the reviews of 41 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews"  Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale Richard Corliss of Time magazine called the film "a one-of-a-kind hybrid: a theological noir action film"  He cited Keanu Reeves' ability to "retain his charisma in a weird-silly moment" as proof that he is a "movie star", and referred to Tilda Swinton as "immaculately decadent"  Corliss also praised the variety of camera placements employed by Francis Lawrence  He was, however, critical of the climax of the film, referring to it as "irrevocably goofy" 
Ella Taylor of LA Weekly wrote: "Constantine, which opts in the end for what I can only describe as a kind of supernatural humanism, is not without its spiritual satisfactions"  Carina Chocano of the Los Angeles Times said that "Keanu Reeves has no peer when it comes to playing these sort of messianic roles—he infuses them with a Zen blankness and serenity that somehow gets him through even the unlikeliest scenes with a quiet, unassuming dignity" Pete Vonder Haar of Film Threat gave the film three stars out of five, writing that "the film (barely) succeeds, thanks to impressive visuals, the idea of an uncaring God wagering with Satan for souls, and two immensely enjoyable scenes (one with Weisz, one with Stormare) in which Reeves actually plays his character as the cynical asshole he really is" Jack Mathews of the New York Daily News gave the film 2 out of 4 stars: "For all its spiritual angst, Constantine is about as silly as fantasies get"  Michael Sragow of The Baltimore Sun also gave the film 2 stars out of 4: "It all comes off as a case of filmmakers wanting to have their communion wafer and eat it, too"  Desson Thomson, a writer for The Washington Post, had similar sentiments of the film, specifically criticizing its differences from the comic book:

If you are a fan of the Hellblazer comic book series, on which this movie is based, you'll definitely need a distraction  The relation between Constantine and its source material is, at best, superfluous  The disparity starts with the original John Constantine (Reeves's character) being from Liverpool, England  Reeves from the city of John and Paul? As if 
Leonard Maltin's annual publication Movie Guide gave the film a BOMB rating, describing it as "dreary, to put it mildly" 
Film critic Roger Ebert gave it 1 5 out of 4 stars, panning the depiction of Hell ("a post-nuclear Los Angeles created by animators with a hangover"), the premise of the film itself ("you would think that God would be the New England Patriots of this contest, but apparently there is a chance that Satan could win"), plot holes, inconsistencies, and general actions depicted throughout the film  He was not particularly critical of the acting, only mentioning it by stating: "Reeves has a deliberately morose energy level in the movie, as befits one who has seen Hell, walks among half-demons, and is dying  He keeps on smoking"  Ebert added the film to his list of "most hated" films 

Novelization and video game
To tie-in to the film's release, a novelization by John Shirley and a video game adaption were produced  The novelization states that the buildings in Hell are built with the souls of the damned, rather than brick, and lined with blood, rather than mortar 

Sequel
In 2011, director Francis Lawrence stated, regarding a sequel:

It's interesting that over the years, Constantine seems like it's become     like it has this sort of cult following, which has been great  It's been embraced  It would be great to figure out a sequel, and if we did, and we've been trying to figure one out, it would be great to do the really dark, scary version  We got caught in that weird PG-13–R no man's land, and we should do the hard-R scary version, which I would love to do 
In November 2012, Guillermo del Toro signed a deal to write and direct a Justice League Dark film centered around DC Comics' supernatural characters, John Constantine among them Reeves said in 2019 and 2021 that he is open to reprise the role in the future In November 2020, Stormare announced in a post on Instagram that a sequel was "in the works", though neither representatives for Warner Bros  nor Reeves immediately responded to requests for comment In September 2022, Deadline Hollywood reported that Warner Bros  will develop a Constantine sequel, with Keanu Reeves set to return in the lead role  Francis Lawrence will return as the film's director, with Akiva Goldsman writing the screenplay  Goldsman will also produce, alongside J  J  Abrams & Hannah Minghella 
Passage 6:
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 is a 2014 American dystopian science fiction war film directed by Francis Lawrence from a screenplay by Peter Craig and Danny Strong, based on the 2010 novel Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins  The sequel to The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013), it is the third installment in The Hunger Games film series  It stars Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Elizabeth Banks, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jeffrey Wright, Stanley Tucci, and Donald Sutherland  In the film, Katniss Everdeen (Lawrence) joins Alma Coin (Moore), the renegade leader of the underground District 13, in a mass rebellion against the Capitol 
Development on a third Hunger Games film was announced in May 2012, after Lionsgate announced Collins' novel would be split into two parts  Lawrence was confirmed to return to direct the final two installments that November, which would be filmed back-to-back  Most of the main cast was rounded out by September 2013 when principal photography began, lasting until June 2014, with filming locations including Boston, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Paris, and Berlin  The film faced controversy after its content was used in political protests in 2014 and 2015 
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square in London on November 10, 2014, and was released in the United States on November 21, by Lionsgate  The film generally positive reviews from critics, with praise for its acting, music, and political subtext, but criticism for its pacing and the decision to split the novel into two films  It grossed over $755 million worldwide, becoming the fifth-highest-grossing film of 2014; it set the record for the largest opening day and opening weekend of 2014 
Among its accolades, Mockingjay – Part 1 was nominated for Best Science Fiction Film at the 41st Saturn Awards, while Lawrence was nominated Best Actress in an Action Movie at the 20th Critics' Choice Awards  The song "Yellow Flicker Beat" by Lorde, the lead single from its soundtrack, was nominated for Best Original Song at the 72nd Golden Globe Awards and Critics' Choice Awards 
The film was followed by the main series' final film, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2, in 2015 

Plot
After being rescued from the destroyed arena in the 75th Hunger Games, tributes Katniss Everdeen, Beetee, and Finnick Odair are taken to District 13, a below-ground district isolated from Panem that has been spearheading the rebellion  Katniss is reunited with her mother and sister Prim and is introduced to President Alma Coin, the rebel leader  Katniss is told that her arrow destroying the forcefield led to riots in over half the districts, joining District 13 in the rebellion, which caused Snow to bomb District 12 in retaliation  Coin asks her to become the "Mockingjay"—a symbol of the rebellion—as part of a "hearts and minds" strategy  Katniss reluctantly agrees after seeing Peeta being manipulated on state television to quell the rebellion  She visits the ruins of District 12, her old house somehow untouched with white roses from President Snow inside 
Katniss meets her film team and is given Effie Trinket as a stylist and close friend, Gale, as a bodyguard  They go to District 8 where Katniss is filmed being saluted by dozens of wounded civilians at a hospital; Snow, seeing the footage, orders an airstrike at the hospital, killing everyone inside  The crew films Katniss and Gale shooting down two Capitol hovercraft and Katniss' rage-filled threat: "If we burn, you burn with us " Afterwards, loggers in District 7 revolt, shouting the same phrase and killing Peacekeepers by detonating land mines 
Katniss and her team travel to District 12 to film her sing "The Hanging Tree"  Hundreds of protesters in District 5, singing the same anthem, launch a suicidal human wave attack against a hydroelectric dam that is the Capitol's primary source of electricity  The attack successfully implodes and breaches the dam, causing a blackout that forces the Capitol to revert to secondary generators  That night, Katniss watches Peeta being interviewed by Caesar Flickerman, the Games' former presenter, when Coin and Beetee hijack the signal to air a clip of Katniss  After seeing it, Peeta suddenly shouts a warning that the Capitol is about to attack District 13  Coin orders a mass evacuation into deep, underground shelters, and the facility survives the attack  Upon emerging, Katniss discovers the area littered with white roses; she concludes that Snow orchestrated this to inform her that whenever she condemns the Capitol, they will torture Peeta in retaliation 
Coin dispatches an elite special-forces team to rescue Peeta and remaining victors Johanna Mason, Enobaria, and Annie Cresta from their prison  Beetee hijacks the Capitol's defense system with a "propo" narrated by Finnick to convince more districts to side with the rebellion in which Finnick reveals that Snow would force "desirable" tributes (including Finnick himself) into prostitution with the threat of killing their families if they refused (which happened to Johanna) and that Snow only became the leader of Panem because he poisoned his opponents  When the propo proves not to be enough, Katniss communicates directly with Snow as a further distraction to buy enough time  Gale's team rescues the victors and escapes the Capitol easily, indicating the Capitol reduced its security on purpose  When Katniss greets Peeta, he unexpectedly attacks and strangles her into unconsciousness before being knocked out by Boggs 
Katniss wakes up and is informed that Peeta has been "hijacked"—brainwashed into trying to kill her, which explains why the Capitol allowed them to escape with him  Peeta is placed in solitary confinement, while a serum is developed to reverse the hijacking effects  Coin announces that the rebels' next objective is the Capitol's principal military stronghold in District 2—now the only district remaining loyal to the Capitol 

Cast
Production
Pre-production
On July 10, 2012, Lionsgate announced that the third and final installment in the series, Mockingjay, would be split into two parts  The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 was released on November 21, 2014, and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 was released on November 20, 2015  Many directors, including Rian Johnson, Francis Lawrence and Alfonso Cuarón were considered for the job  On November 1, 2012, Lawrence, director of Catching Fire, announced he would return to direct both final parts in the series



ground_truth: Northern Ireland

prompt_front: Answer the question based on the given passages. Only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Professional cyclist Sara Symington competed in which Olympic Games held in Sydeney, Australia?

The following are given passages.
Context 4: On December 6, 2012, Danny Strong announced that he would be writing the third and fourth films  On February 15, 2013, Lionsgate confirmed the script for Part 1 was written by Strong, giving him permission to write Part 2  Later in August, Hemsworth confirmed that shooting of the film would begin in September 2013 The film's production began on September 16, 2013, in Boston, Atlanta, and Los Angeles  Studio Babelsberg co-produced and oversaw production services for the film 

Casting
On August 26, 2013, it was announced that actress Stef Dawson had joined the cast and would portray Annie Cresta  Lionsgate announced on September 13, 2013, that Julianne Moore had joined the cast of both Mockingjay's parts to play President Alma Coin  Over the next month, Patina Miller, Mahershala Ali, Wes Chatham, and Elden Henson joined the cast as Commander Paylor, Boggs, Castor, and Pollux, respectively  There was a casting call for extras on September 23  Robert Knepper was cast as Antonius, a character who does not appear in the books and is an addition to the adaptation  Knepper has stated that during his audition he knew that the lines he received were not what he would end up doing, adding that "they [Lionsgate] are so secretive about this " Wyatt Russell was originally offered a role in both parts of Mockingjay, but his father Kurt confirmed in September 2013 that he turned down the offer to star in 22 Jump Street 

Filming
Shooting began on September 23, 2013 in Atlanta and concluded on June 20, 2014 in Berlin  Part 1 was filmed back-to-back with Part 2  In mid-October, the crews were spotted filming in Rockmart  The crew and cast took a break to promote The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and filming resumed on December 2, 2013  On December 14, 2013, shooting took place at the Marriott Marquis in Atlanta, Georgia  On December 18, shooting began at Caldwell Tanks in Newnan, Georgia Philip Seymour Hoffman died on February 2, 2014  Lionsgate released a statement stating that Hoffman had completed filming most of his scenes prior to his death  A dedication to him appears ahead of the closing credits 
On April 18, 2014, producer Nina Jacobson announced that filming in Atlanta had just wrapped up, followed by director Francis Lawrence announcing the next day about moving production to Europe  It was announced that they would be filming battle scenes in Paris and at Berlin Tempelhof Airport in Berlin  They began filming in the streets of Paris and in the city of Ivry-sur-Seine on May 7, where Lawrence and Hemsworth were spotted during the filming of some scenes among extras On May 9, it was reported that filming was taking place in Noisy le Grand, Paris where Lawrence, Hemsworth, Hutcherson, and Claflin were spotted on the set which re-created the world of Panem  It is the same location where Brazil was filmed in 1984 

Costumes
Christian Cordella, a costume illustrator on the first movie, returned to sketch the outfits for District 13 

Music
The music was created to convey the dark feel of the film  On October 9, 2014, it was revealed that the Trinity School boys' choir recorded tracks for the score, written by James Newton Howard  Jennifer Lawrence performed the film's version of the song "The Hanging Tree", originally featured in the novel, but was not thrilled about having to sing and cried the day of the performance  As of the evening of November 25, 2014, the song was #4 on the Apple's iTunes top 150 list  "The Hanging Tree" also peaked at #1 in Austria and Hungary and peaked at #12 on Billboard Hot 100 in the U S 

Score
Marketing
Tim Palen, the head of marketing for Lionsgate said, "When we started, we decided to look at this as one big movie that's eight hours long  Otherwise, it's going to be kind of overwhelming to do a new campaign for each movie " He also added that he saw the biggest potential in international growth and that they matched Iron Man 3 domestically, but were aiming to improve internationally for the two Mockingjay films  He revealed in an interview with Variety that there would be reveals of the marketing campaign at the Cannes Film Festival in May and San Diego Comic Con in July On May 14, 2014 TheHungerGamesExclusive com was launched  It featured three stills from the movie, featuring Woody Harrelson, Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Jeffrey Wright with an additional behind-the-scenes still of director Francis Lawrence and Mahershala Ali  The website also featured other content, including a short GIF image of Julianne Moore as President Coin and a video interview with Moore  There was also an in-depth interview with director Francis Lawrence, producer Nina Jacobson and screenwriter Peter Craig  A page from the script of Part 1 was also released in addition to a motion poster, with the tagline, "Fire burns brighter in the darkness "On May 17, 2014, while principal photography was underway in Paris, some of the cast and crew including Lawrence, Hutcherson, Hemsworth, Claflin, Moore, Sutherland, Lawrence, and Jacobson attended the 2014 Cannes Film Festival for a photo shoot and party bash to excite international investors  Co-chairman of Lionsgate Rob Friedman said in response to why they would incur such big expense even though the film isn't actually playing at the festival that it was convenient as the cast were in Europe already and that "it's a big opportunity for our international distributors to actually hear what the worldwide plans are for the film, which opens in November  Cannes is the best publicity opportunity from an international penetration perspective "Kabam announced their partnership with Lionsgate to create a mobile game based on The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1, to tie in with the film's release  Kabam produced an exclusive role playing, card collection mobile game  In the game, players assume the identity of District members sent on a mission in order to build their alliance, liberate their District, and rebuild Panem  "Lionsgate has an unparalleled track record of developing and producing blockbuster movie franchises like The Hunger Games," said Kabam Chief Operating Officer Kent Wakeford  "Partnering with Lionsgate, Kabam will build a mobile game that's as much fun to play as the movie is to watch  The game will be developed in Kabam's China studio, the same place where the hit film-based game The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies was created and went on to generate more than $100 million in revenue during its first year "The film was not listed on the schedule for San Diego Comic-Con International 2014, which raised questions on their absence by fans and the press  Lionsgate announced on July 18, 2014, a week before the event, that the film would have a presence at the convention  Lionsgate partnered up with Samsung to debut the (including the viral videos which were considered 'teasers', third) teaser trailer on Samsung's new Galaxy Tab S at a special event on Friday, July 25, which was being hosted off-site at the Hard Rock Hotel  The partnership allowed Samsung users to view the trailer before the online release, download the first two movies for free as well as be given a free complimentary ticket to the movie  On July 28, the teaser trailer officially debuted online through the movie's official Facebook page and YouTube account   Within minutes, #MockingjayTeaserTrailerToday, #OurLeadertheMockingjay, and #OfficialTeaserTrailer became trending topics worldwide on Twitter  A full worldwide official trailer was released on September 15 

Viral marketing
A viral marketing campaign began on June 21, 2014, with the return of TheCapitol PNOn June 25, TheCapitol PN viral site released a video titled "President Snow's Address - 'Together As One'" featuring a speech by Donald Sutherland, in character as President Snow addressing the citizens of Panem and warning them that if they fight the system, they will be the ones to face the repercussions  The video also briefly features Josh Hutcherson, in character as Peeta Mellark, who at the final events of the previous film was taken hostage by the Capitol  The video went viral on YouTube becoming the most watched trailer during the last week of June in the US while trending as the most "Popular Video on YouTube" in Australia and Canada  The video, billed as a teaser trailer, was attached to screenings of Transformers: Age of Extinction beginning June 28 Two weeks later on July 9, Capitol TV released a second viral video titled 'President Snow's Address — Unity' featuring again another speech by President Snow with Peeta Mellark standing beside him, but this time accompanied by Jena Malone in character as Johanna Mason, who was also captured by the Capitol at the end of the previous film, and a group of peacekeepers  The speech was interrupted by Jeffrey Wright, in character as Beetee Latier, a technician from District 13, to announce that "the Mockingjay lives " Within minutes, #TheMockingjayLives and '#2 - Unity' became the top two trending topics worldwide on Twitter  The video, billed as the second teaser trailer for the film, was played with screenings of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes On July 24, shortly before the trailer's official release, a teaser poster for the movie was posted on The Capitol's Instagram account, but was quickly deleted  Shortly after the removal of the poster, the account issued an apology "[for the] technical issues", presenting the poster's posting as a hack from the District 13 rebellions On August 6, after few clues given on the official Facebook page, www district13 co in was launched  The website introduced new posters for the District 13 characters including Beetee, Coin, Plutarch, Finnick, Haymitch and Effie 

Political ramifications
On November 20, 2014, some showings were reportedly canceled in Thailand because protestors were using the three-finger salute at demonstrations against the country's military government On November 24, 2014, it was reported that in relation to the Ferguson unrest following the shooting of Michael Brown, a protester had scrawled graffiti reading "If we burn, you burn with us" on an arch in St  Louis, Missouri On September 11, 2015, some Catalan pro-independence protesters used the three-finger salute at the Free Way to the Catalan Republic against Spain's government 

Release
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 was released on November 19, 2014, in 9 territories including France, Greece, Scandinavia and Brazil, and then expanded to a further 59 on November 20, 2014, including the UK, Germany, Australia, Italy, Mexico and South Korea  With 17 more released on November 21, 2014, including the United States, the total launch was in 85 markets, making it the biggest release of the year and Lionsgate's widest release ever  This was surpassed by its sequel across 87 markets in 2015  The film was released in China on February 8, 2015, in 2D and 3D, making it the first film in the franchise to be released in 3D in any territory and debuted in more than 4,000 screens   Director Francis Lawrence stated: "we recently saw the 3-D version of Mockingjay – Part 1 before its release in China, and the new level of immersion was really fantastic " The film was dedicated to the memory of Philip Seymour Hoffman 

Home video
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 was released on Digital HD on February 17, 2015, and was followed by a Blu-ray/DVD release on March 6, 2015  It topped the home video sales chart for two consecutive weeks despite facing competition from Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb  The film's home video sales earned a $73 1 million with 4 5 million copies sold, making it the fifth best-selling title of 2015  The entire Hunger Games series was released on 4K UHD Blu-Ray on November 8, 2016 

Reception
Box office
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 grossed $337 1 million in the USA & Canada, and $418 2 million in other countries, for a worldwide total of $755 4 million against $125 million budget ($190 million including promotion and advertising costs)  Calculating in all expenses, Deadline Hollywood estimated that the film made a profit of $211 61 million  Worldwide, it is the fifth-highest-grossing film of 2014  Its worldwide opening of $273 8 million is the sixteenth-largest of all time, the second-largest opening of 2014 behind Transformers: Age of Extinction ($302 1 million), and the largest among The Hunger Games franchise 

North America
In the U S  and Canada, the film was released across 3,200 theaters on Thursday night, November 20, 2014, and was widened to 4,151 theaters on Friday, November 21, 2014  The film earned $17 million from Thursday night previews which is the biggest of 2014 but was lower than its two predecessors  It earned $55 million in its opening day which is the largest opening day of 2014 and the sixth-largest in November but nevertheless still lower than its predecessors  It is the fifteenth film to debut on Friday with $50 million or more, and the nineteenth film to earn $50 million or more in a single day  The film topped the box office in its opening weekend with $121 9 million, and became the biggest opening of 2014 surpassing the $100 million record of Transformers: Age of Extinction as well as becoming the fifteenth-largest,  the 28th film to debut atop with over $100 million, and the only franchise to have three films earn over $100 million in a weekend  Its opening weekend is also the sixth-largest of November  Its opening weekend gross was still relatively lower than the openings of The Hunger Games ($152 million) and Catching Fire ($158 million)  In its second weekend the film remained at the summit earning $56 9 million and set a record for the third-highest 5-day Thanksgiving gross with $82 6 million behind The Hunger Games: Catching Fire ($109 9 million) and Frozen ($93 6 million) and the fifth-highest 3-day Thanksgiving gross with $56 9 million  The film topped the box office for three consecutive weekends before being overtaken by Exodus: Gods and Kings in its fourth weekend  The film passed the $300 million mark in its 6th weekend (37 days later) and became the second film of 2014 to earn over $300 million at the box office after Guardians of the Galaxy  On Wednesday, January 21, 2015, sixty-one days after its initial release, the film surpassed Guardians of the Galaxy and became the highest-grossing film of 2014 in North America until it was surpassed by American Sniper in the next two months It earned $337 1 million at the North American box office making it the third-highest-grossing film in The Hunger Games franchise, the second-highest-grossing film of 2014 (behind American Sniper), the fourth-highest-grossing science fiction film based on a book, the fourth-highest-grossing young-adult adaptation  and the 36th-highest-grossing film in North America  It is also the first film to cross the $300 million mark without 3D or IMAX since Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), and also the highest-grossing non-3D, non IMAX film since Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) 

Outside North America
Outside North America, Mockingjay – Part 1 was also released on the same day in 85 other markets, with the notable exceptions of China, Japan, and India, making it the widest release of any film in 2014  The film earned over $33 million in two days (Wednesday–Thursday) and $67 5 million in three days (Wednesday–Friday) from 17,000 screens  In its opening weekend overseas, the film earned $154 3 million from 17,963 screens in 85 markets which is 4% higher than Catching Fire  The film remained at number one in its second and third weekend overseas earning $67 million and $32 9 million, respectively  In its fourth weekend, the film fell to number two as a result of being overtaken by The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies The film's top openings occurred in the UK, Ireland and Malta ($19 9 million), Germany ($13 7 million), Mexico ($12 1 million), Russia and the CIS ($11 1 million), France ($10 5 million), Australia ($10 1 million), Brazil ($8 8 million) and India ($5 1 million)  The film also grossed $3 9 million in the Philippines  In China, where the film was released over two and a half months later—on February 8, 2015, it had a strong opening day with $9 87 million and went on to earn $31 4 million through its opening week, which is more than what Catching Fire earned through its entire run  The film had an unsuccessful opening in Japan with $500,000 debuting at eighth place at the Japanese box office and ended up making a mere $1 6 million after its run It became the highest-grossing Hunger Games film of all time in 31 countries including Brazil, Italy, Chile, Venezuela, Central America, and Portugal 

Critical response
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 received generally positive reviews from critics, with praise aimed at its political subtext and acting performances (particularly that of Lawrence), but criticism for its lack of action and the makers' splitting the source material for two separate adaptations  Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes reported a 69% approval rating, based on 304 reviews, with an average score of 6 3/10  The site's consensus reads: "The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 sets up the franchise finale with a penultimate chapter loaded with solid performances and smart political subtext, though it comes up short on the action front " The film holds a Metacritic score of 64 out of 100, based on 46 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews"  Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film an "A−" grade, indicating positive reactions from paying viewers Cath Clarke of Time Out gave the film four out of five stars  She praised the politics as "tensely gripping" and felt it had a lot to say about the "ethical ambiguities of war " She praised Lawrence's performance as "strong, smart, stubborn, angry and full of heart" and noted it had grown "deeper and darker " Kevin Harley, who reviewed the film for Total Film, also awarded the film four out of five stars  He felt the film held up due to Lawrence's performance and solid supporting cast  He also offered praise to the action scenes and diverse story telling  He concluded that the movie was "gutsy" and managed to successfully divide the novel into a film "less on scraps than strategy" and "less on action than debates" though he noted this threatened to "distance viewers "Robbie Collin awarded the film three out of five stars  In his review for The Telegraph, he praised the film for being "intense, stylish, topical, well-acted" and declared that it "remains one of the most fascinating, vividly realised fantasy landscapes in recent cinema " Despite praising Lawrence and Hoffman's performance, he felt that it was overcrowded with "two hours of preamble with no discernible payoff " He concluded that the film "fell short" and "could not be called satisfying " Henry Barnes of The Guardian also gave the film three out of five stars  He felt it offered "thrills" despite "lacking a solid structure" and featured "limp special effects " He was also critical of the "creaky script" and felt it lacked some of the "terror" of the previous installments, but praised Lawrence for her performance Todd McCarthy, who reviewed the film for The Hollywood Reporter, felt the installment was "disappointingly bland and unnecessarily protracted " He was critical of the film's leisurely pace and noted it felt "like a manufactured product through and through, ironic and sad given its revolutionary theme " Richard Corliss of Time felt the film was a placeholder for the second installment and noted "Lawrence isn't given much opportunity to do anything spectacularly right here "

Accolades
Sequel
On July 10, 2012, Lionsgate announced that the second part of the Mockingjay adaptation was set for a release on November 20, 2015   Francis Lawrence announced that he would return to direct the final part as well 
Passage 7:
The Hunger Games (film series)
The Hunger Games film series is composed of science fiction dystopian adventure films, based on The Hunger Games trilogy of novels by American author Suzanne Collins  The films are distributed by Lionsgate and produced by Nina Jacobson and Jon Kilik  The series feature an ensemble cast including Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss Everdeen, Josh Hutcherson as Peeta Mellark, Liam Hemsworth as Gale Hawthorne, Woody Harrelson as Haymitch Abernathy, Elizabeth Banks as Effie Trinket, Stanley Tucci as Caesar Flickerman, and Donald Sutherland as President Snow 
The first three films set various box office records  The Hunger Games (2012) set records for the opening day and the biggest opening weekend for an original IP  Catching Fire (2013) set the record for biggest opening weekend of November  Mockingjay – Part 1 (2014) had the largest opening day and weekend of 2014  The films, including Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015), were praised for their themes and Lawrence's performance 
The Hunger Games is the 21st-highest-grossing film franchise of all time, having grossed over US$2 97 billion worldwide 
A prequel film, titled The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, based on the eponymous novel, is set to be released on November 17, 2023 

Background
Following the release of Suzanne Collins's novel The Hunger Games, on September 14, 2008, Hollywood film studios began looking to adapt the book into film  In March 2009, Color Force, an independent studio founded by producer Nina Jacobson, bought the film rights to the book : 12  She then sought out production company Lionsgate to help her produce the film  Collins was also attached to adapt the novel; she began the first draft after completing the third novel in the series, Mockingjay (2010)  The search for a director began in 2010 with three directors in the running; David Slade, Sam Mendes, and Gary Ross  Ross was ultimately chosen to direct  By the time Collins had finished the script, Ross decided to go through the script with Collins and screenwriter Billy Ray 
In October 2010, scripts were sent to the actors, and casting occurred between March and May 2011  The first role cast was of the protagonist, Katniss Everdeen  As many as thirty actresses were in talks to play the part, with Jennifer Lawrence, Hailee Steinfeld, Abigail Breslin, and Chloë Grace Moretz being mentioned most  The role was given to Lawrence The roles of Peeta Mellark, Katniss' fellow tribute, and Gale Hawthorne, her best friend, began casting later that month  Top contenders for Peeta included Josh Hutcherson, Alexander Ludwig (later cast as Cato), Hunter Parrish, Evan Peters, and Lucas Till  Contenders for Gale included Robbie Amell, Liam Hemsworth, David Henrie, and Drew Roy  On April 4, it was reported that Hemsworth had been cast as Gale, and Hutcherson had been cast as Peeta 

Films
The Hunger Games (2012)
Every year, in the ruins of what was once North America, the Capitol of the nation of Panem forces each of the 12 districts to send a boy and girl tribute between the ages of 12 and 18 to compete in the Hunger Games: a nationally televised event in which the 'tributes' fight each other to the death until one survivor remains  When Primrose Everdeen is "reaped," her older sister Katniss volunteers in her place as tribute to enter the games and is forced to rely upon her sharp instincts and knowledge when she's pitted against highly trained and fierce "tributes" from all of the other districts and has to think quickly on her feet to survive 

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013)
Along with fellow District 12 victor Peeta Mellark, Katniss Everdeen returns home safely after winning the 74th Annual Hunger Games  Winning means that they must leave their loved ones behind and embark on a Victory Tour throughout the districts for a couple of days  Along the way Katniss senses a rebellion simmering upon the Capitol - one that she and Peeta may have sparked  - but the Capitol is still under control as President Snow prepares for the 75th Hunger Games - the Third Quarter Quell in which past victors will be reaped - that could change Panem forever 

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay (2014–2015)
Part 1 (2014)
Following her rescue from the devastating Quarter Quell, Katniss Everdeen awakes in the complex beneath the supposedly destroyed District 13  Her home, District 12, has been reduced to rubble by the Capitol  Peeta Mellark was kidnapped by the Capitol and is now brainwashed and being held captive by President Snow  Snow wants Peeta to forget everything he had loved about Katniss  At the same time, Katniss also learns about a secret rebellion spreading throughout Panem - a rebellion that places her at the center of attention, and compels her to turn the tables on President Snow 

Part 2 (2015)
Realizing the stakes are no longer just for survival, Katniss Everdeen teams up with her closest friends, Peeta Mellark, Gale Hawthorne, and Finnick Odair, on the ultimate mission for peace  Together, they leave District 13, to liberate citizens from a war that tears Panem apart more than ever  President Snow becomes obsessed with destroying Katniss Everdeen and everyone and everything she loves  Ahead lie mortal traps, dangerous enemies, and moral choices that will determine the future of millions 

The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes (2023)
In August 2017, Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer expressed interest in spin-offs of The Hunger Games, with intentions to create a writers room to explore the concept  In June 2019, Chairman of the Lionsgate Motion Picture Group Joe Drake, announced that the company is communicating and working closely with Suzanne Collins in options to adapt the prequel to the original trilogy, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, which was released on May 19, 2020 By April 2020, a film adaptation was announced to be officially in development  Francis Lawrence will return as director, with a script written by Michael Arndt, from a story adaptation by Suzanne Collins  Nina Jacobson will return as producer, alongside Brad Simpson  The project will be developed by Color Force, and distributed by Lionsgate  In August 2021, Drake stated that the film was expected to start production during the first half of 2022 for a projected late 2023 or early 2024 release date, and was reportedly in pre-production  In April 2022, it was revealed that the film would be released on November 17, 2023  In June 2022, filming for the film began in Berlin with Tom Blyth and Rachel Zegler shooting their roles 

Cast and crew
Additional crew
Production
Development
Filming for the franchise began on May 23, 2011, and finished on June 20, 2014 : 138 Suzanne Collins and Louise Rosner acted as executive producers on the first two films  Other executive producers of the first film include Robin Bissell and Shantal Feghali  Co-producers are Diana Alvarez, Martin Cohen, Louis Phillips, Bryan Unkeless, and Aldric La'auli Porter  Color Force and Lionsgate collaborated on all four films  It was announced on November 1, 2012, that the studio had decided to split the final book, Mockingjay (2010), into two films: The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 (2014) and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (2015), much like Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 1 (2010) and 2 (2011), and The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1 (2011) and 2 (2012) 

Directors
Gary Ross directed the first film (The Hunger Games), and despite initially stating otherwise on April 10, 2012, Lionsgate announced that Ross would not return to direct the sequel  On April 19, 2012, it was confirmed that Francis Lawrence would direct the sequel instead, and on November 1, 2012, it was confirmed that Lawrence would return and direct the final two films in the series, based on the novel Mockingjay 

Scripts
Suzanne Collins began adapting the first book to film after she finished writing Mockingjay  Collins had experience in writing screenplays after writing Clifford's Puppy Days and other children's television shows  When Gary Ross was announced as director for the film in 2010, he began to work with Collins and veteran writer Billy Ray to bring the novel to life  After Francis Lawrence took over as director, he brought in Simon Beaufoy and Michael Arndt to write the script for Catching Fire  The final two films of the series were written by Danny Strong and Peter Craig 

Casting
Once the three leads were cast, casting shifted to the other tributes  Jack Quaid was cast as Marvel, Leven Rambin as Glimmer, Amandla Stenberg as Rue, and Dayo Okeniyi as Thresh  Alexander Ludwig (who auditioned for Peeta) was cast as Cato, Isabelle Fuhrman (who auditioned for Katniss) as Clove, and Jacqueline Emerson as Foxface  Following the casting of tributes, the adult cast began to come together  Elizabeth Banks was cast as Effie Trinket, the District 12 escort  Woody Harrelson was cast as Haymitch Abernathy, District 12's mentor  Lenny Kravitz was cast as Cinna, Katniss' stylist  Wes Bentley was cast as game maker Seneca Crane  Stanley Tucci was cast as Caesar Flickerman, Panem's celebrity host  Donald Sutherland was cast as Coriolanus Snow, Panem's president  Willow Shields was cast as Primrose Everdeen, Katniss' younger sister In July 2012, the cast for the second film was announced  Jena Malone would play Johanna Mason  Philip Seymour Hoffman would play Plutarch Heavensbee, Sam Claflin would play Finnick Odair  It was later announced that Jeffrey Wright was cast as Beetee, Alan Ritchson as Gloss, Lynn Cohen as Mags, and Amanda Plummer as Wiress 
In August and September 2013, it was revealed that Stef Dawson would play Annie Cresta, Natalie Dormer would play Cressida, Evan Ross would play Messalla, and Julianne Moore would play President Alma Coin in the final two films 
In May 2022, it was announced that Tom Blyth was cast as the younger version of Coriolanus Snow in the prequel film  Later the same month, Rachel Zegler was cast in the role of Lucy Gray Baird  The following month, Josh Andrés Rivera, Hunter Schafer and Jason Schwartzman were cast in the roles of Sejanus Plinth, Tigris Snow and Lucretius "Lucky" Flickerman  respectively 

Filming
Principal photography for The Hunger Games began on May 24, 2011, and concluded on September 15, 2011  Charlotte, NC was used for the Capitol scenes  An abandoned village in Hickory, NC was the filming location for District 12  The arena scenes were filmed on the outskirts of Wilmington, NC Principal photography for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire began on September 10, 2012, in Atlanta, Georgia and concluded in April 2013  In November 2012, production moved to Hawaii to film the arena scenes  Filming took a Christmas break before filming resumed for two weeks in mid-January  In March 2013, the film went back to Hawaii for re-shoots  Atlanta was used for all Capitol scenes  Hawaii for the arena scenes, and Oakland, New Jersey, for District 12 scenes 
Principal photography for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay began on September 23, 2013 and concluded on June 20, 2014  Majority of filming for the Mockingjay films was filmed in soundstages in a studio in Atlanta, until April 18, 2014  Production then moved to Paris, with filming beginning there on May 5, 2014 
Philip Seymour Hoffman, who portrays Plutarch Heavensbee, died on February 2, 2014  At the time of his death, he had completed filming his scenes for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 and had a week left of shooting for Part 2  Lionsgate released a statement stating that, since the majority of Hoffman's scenes were completed, the release date for Part 2 would not be affected 

Reception
Box office performance
All the Hunger Games films finished first at the North American box office during both their opening and second weekend  In North America, The Hunger Games film series is the second highest-grossing film series based on young adult books, after the Harry Potter series, earning over $1 4 billion  Worldwide, it is the third highest-grossing film series based on young-adult books after the film series of Harry Potter and The Twilight Saga, respectively, having grossed over $2 9 billion  In North America, it is the eighth highest-grossing film franchise of all time  Worldwide, it is currently (11 April 2022) the 21st highest-grossing film franchise of all time 

Critical and public response
Each  installment of the Hunger Games series received positive reviews from critics  The first two installments (notably the second) were critically acclaimed, while the last two films were met with generally positive  responses from critics  All The Hunger Games films received a "Fresh Rating" (>60%) on the review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, with the first two films receiving a "Certified Fresh" rating (>75%) 

Accolades
Music
Soundtracks
Singles
"Safe & Sound"
"Eyes Open"
"Atlas"
"We Remain"
"Elastic Heart"
"Who We Are"
"Everybody Wants to Rule the World"
"Meltdown"
"All My Love"
"Yellow Flicker Beat"
"The Hanging Tree"

See also
Battle Royale (film)
Battle royale genre



ground_truth: 2000 Summer Olympic Games