Put the verbs in brackets in the past sin1ple, past perfect, or past continuous. In the autumn of 2008, Nelson Piquet Jr. 1 found
(find) himself in the middle of one of sport's greatest
controversies - had he or hadn't he deliberately crashed his car
during the Singapore Grand Prix?
Piquet Jr. ... (form) part of the Renault
Formula 1 team which also ... (include) the
Spanish driver Fernando Alonso. According to Piquet, the day
before the race, while he ...(prepare) to drive,
two senior Renault F1 directors asked to speak to Piquet Jr. He
went to see them in their offices, and as soon as he
... (sit down), the two directors took out a map
of the Singapore circuit. They then ... (show)
him the exact corner on the map where they wanted him to crash
his car, and the exact moment when they wanted it to happen. The
directors ... (choose) this corner because they
knew rescue teams couldn't get to this part of the track quickly, so
all the drivers would have to slow down. Piquet agreed to 'sacrifice' his race so that his
teammate, Alonso, could win.
While Piquet
... (drive)
around the circuit for the
14th time, he
(crash) his car. This allowed Alonso to make
an early pit stop and ... (give) him an
advantage. After Piquet crashed, Alonso 11 _
(overtake) the other drivers and 12 (go) on to
win the race.
In 2009, after Piquet ... (leave) Renault, there
was an investigation. Piquet admitted that he
•
(crash) his car on purpose under
instruction from Renault. At first, Renault 15 ___ _ _ _
(accuse) Piquet of lying, but finally they 16 _ _
(admit) their guilt.
The past simple tense is quite straightforward. The main problem is its spelling rules, which you’ll find below.
We use the past simple to describe an action that started in the past and ended in the past. It could be something that happened twenty years ago or something that happened two minutes ago. It started. It stopped. It’s over.
I visited a client in London yesterday.
She planned the event all by herself.
The most common time expressions used for the past simple are: yesterday, a week (month, year) ago, last (month, year, weekend, Monday) night, the day before yesterday, two days (months, years) ago. The time expression appears either at the beginning or at the end of the sentence – never in the middle of the sentence.
Forming the Past Simple
Subject Verb + d, ed, ied
or irregular form (V2) Rest of Sentence
I / He / She / It You / We / They walked to the shop yesterday
slept late last Saturday
The past simple is usually formed by adding d, ed, or ied to the base form of the verb, however, in English there are many irregular verbs that take on a completely different form in the past tense. Some people call this the V2 form of the verb. The best thing to do is to try and memorize them.
Negative Sentences in the Past Simple Tense
Spelling Tip
When shortening the 3rd person (he, she, it) negative, just remove the o in not and add an apostrophe (‘)
did not > didn’t
To create a negative sentence in the past simple, use didn’t (did not) + the base form of the verb.
Note: Save the long forms (did not) for when you want to create emphasis. When speaking, put the stress on ‘not’.
Subject didn’t + verb in the base form Rest of Sentence
I / He / She / It You / We / They didn’t walk to the shop yesterday
didn’t sleep late last Saturday
I didn’t talk to John yesterday.
He didn’t steal those ideas from the company.
You didn’t show me the photos from the wedding.
Ron did not sign the document.