Mountaineering Popularity Factors

This question asks us to identify the reason, based on the provided passage, why mountaineering is not considered as popular a sport as football or cricket.

Mountaineering Characteristics from Passage

The passage describes mountaineering as a challenging activity. Key points highlighted include:

• Mountaineering is often very difficult, differing significantly from climbing simple hills.
• The paths on mountains are usually very steep, and some sides are vertical, making climbing progress slow (taking many hours to ascend even a small height like one hundred feet).
• There are inherent dangers involved, such as the risk of falling, which can lead to severe injury or death.
• Reaching the summit provides a highly rewarding experience, described as a "wonderful feeling" and making one feel "god-like." This accomplishment offers a profound sense of freedom.
• An anecdote illustrates this desire for freedom and accomplishment: two prisoners escaped and climbed Mount Kenya simply to experience the feeling associated with conquering a difficult mountain.

Popularity Options Explained

Let's evaluate each option in the context of the passage:

1. Option 1: It may take many hours or days

   The passage explicitly mentions that climbing a mountain "may take many hours" or "even days." This is presented as a factual characteristic and a significant difficulty of the sport. However, the passage does not explicitly state that this time commitment is the reason *why* mountaineering is less popular than football or cricket. It describes the nature of the sport, rather than defining its comparative popularity levels based on this factor.

2. Option 2: There are no spectators in this sport

   The passage does not mention spectators at all, neither their presence nor their absence in mountaineering. Therefore, this cannot be the reason cited by the passage for the sport's popularity level compared to others.

3. Option 3: People do not want to enjoy a god like feeling

   This statement contradicts the information provided in the passage. The text clearly states that climbers feel "god-like" and experience a "wonderful feeling," suggesting that people do seek and value this sensation. The example of the prisoners climbing Mount Kenya further supports that this feeling is a strong motivator.

4. Option 4: None of these

   After analyzing the options against the passage: Option 1 highlights a difficulty mentioned, but the passage doesn't link it directly as the cause for lower popularity. Option 2 is not mentioned in the text. Option 3 is contradicted by the text. Since the passage focuses on describing the challenging yet rewarding aspects of mountaineering without explicitly stating the reasons for its comparative lack of popularity against sports like football and cricket, none of the specific reasons provided in options 1-3 are directly supported as the cause in the text. Therefore, "None of these" is the appropriate choice.

Sport Popularity Conclusion

The passage details the demanding nature and unique rewards of mountaineering. While it acknowledges that the sport can be time-consuming and difficult, it does not explicitly attribute the sport's lower popularity compared to football or cricket to this factor or any other factor listed in options 1 through 3. The text describes the activity itself rather than analyzing the specific reasons for its popularity ranking. Consequently, based strictly on the information presented and the causal link required by the question, "None of these" is the correct conclusion.