Unit 8 - Grammar Exercises

Exercise 2 Read the short extract from the article about Alex Honnold. Then open the brackets and fill in the gaps with the words in the past perfect tense.

#1. Honnold couldn’t use a rope or anything else to help him stick to the slippery stone. The few people who ________ (climb)

#2. Half Dome before _______ (use) ropes,

#3. and it _______ (take) them more than a day to do the climb.

#4. On a bright September morning, Honnold was clinging to the face of Half Dome, less than 100 feet (30 meters) from the top. He _______ (climb) forty-five minutes before he stopped suddenly.

#5. Something potentially disastrous ________ (occur)

#6. he _______ (lose) some of his confidence.

#7. He _______ (not feel) that way two days before when he’d been racing up the same rock with a rope.

#8. That climb _______ (go) well. Today though, Honnold hesitated. He knew that even the slightest doubt could cause a deadly fall, thousands of feet to the valley floor below.

#9. He knew he had to get moving, so he _______ (chalk) his hands, before started climbing again. Within minutes, he was at the top. Bloggers spread the news of Honnold’s two-hour-and-fifty-minute free solo, and climbers were amazed.

#10. On this warm fall day, 23-year-old Alex Honnold had just _____ (set) a new record in one of climbing’s biggest challenges.

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