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English language (monolingual) [Non-PRO] General / Conversation / Greetings / Letters
English term or phrase:holding him down
Hello everyone,
"For one of his fights, Artem still had about thirteen pounds to cut on the evening before the weigh‑ins, i.e. just shy of one stone in under twenty‑four hours. He decided that he’d cut half that night and do the other half the next morning. After a few intense hours, Artem had managed to get rid of seven pounds before going to bed to get some rest. He woke shortly afterwards, feeling a bit delirious. He was extremely thirsty, and he remembered that there was a two‑litre bottle of Fanta in his refrigerator. I’ll go down and have a little sip just to quench my thirst, he thought. Ten minutes later, he was sitting at his kitchen table, staring at an empty bottle of Fanta. He had consumed every last drop – and put back on all the weight that he had spent the evening torturing himself to cut. He was back up at dawn and spent the entire morning in the bath to make up for his mistake, with his mother ***holding him down*** to make sure he couldn’t back out. Artem still managed to make the weight, but that’s a good example of how not to do it."
1 to hold someone who is lying down, so that they cannot move 3 to prevent something from developing, or to prevent someone from doing what they want
Does "holding him down" really imply that she did not let him get out of the bath, or does it imply that she held him down, for example, by not letting him drink?
Explanation: Although she might possibly not have been continuously physically restraining him, that is certainly at least partially the implication here.
Remember that in a salt or Epsom salts bath, he would have greater buoyancy, and so it would help him anyway to stay submerged if his mother actually held him down.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 57 minutes (2016-12-09 05:59:14 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Your meaning #1
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 7 heures (2016-12-09 12:04:37 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
I think as Gallagy says, it's a bit of both, really... certainly as I said, I don't think it would be a case of 'physical restraint', but as Charles says, perhaps her physical presence to help him stick at it.
@ Tony I wasn't suggesting AE at all as I know it's Hiberno or rather, Dublinese, but this is a conversational style and you know how phrasal verbs can often get mixed up, mangled or take on new meanings? Here I'm suggesting it equates to "hold sb to" meaning that you ensure they don't back out of doing sth. I think you have to take the "back out" into account as that is very clear here...
Thank you, gentlemen, for your comments. I personally know a few martial artists who try to make the weight before their fights through torturous dehydration methods - vomiting being one of them. That's why I may have interpreted this text like that.
Good point. If he's determined to get out of the bath it seems unlikely that his mother could physically prevent him, though if she tried he probably wouldn't resist. But it's difficult to imagine her by the bath pushing him down for hours on end. She was probably sitting there with her knitting, or whatever, encouraging him to stick at it and telling him to stay put if he showed signs of being about to give up.
I think this means she is going to make sure he perseveres at it...stays in the bath until the weight is gone with no chance of backing out or giving up so holding him down=holding him to it
Nothing to do with vomiting and toilets here, I'm afraid! Do note that it says "in the bath" — that can only mean the bath-tub itself; note this is not 'bathroom', which is an American euphemism for 'toilet'.
Thank you, Dariusz. Well, I can't be absolutely sure, but I think that by "bath" John (the author) doesn't mean toilet. Earlier he writes: "The weight-cutting process is different for every fighter, but it generally involves weeks of strict dieting, several days of water-loading on fight week, followed by an intense twenty-four hours of draining fluids from the body – usually via a sauna or a hot salt bath... I had to laugh once when I returned from helping one of my fighters to cut their last few pounds in the bath and Orlagh said she’d like to try it some time – as if it were a case of putting on some music, lighting a few candles and chilling out in a nice, relaxing bath for an hour! In reality, you’re spending hours in a hot bath, with Epsom salts drawing the fluids out of your body... Then Thursday afternoon comes and the cut begins in earnest with the baths or the sauna. The heat draws the moisture from the body and the pounds fall off, but it’s long and it’sarduous and it’s bloody unpleasant."
As I see it, he spent the whole morning vomiting (in order to make the weight) with his face in the toilet, so his mother may indeed have held his head down to make sure he would dehydrate enough.
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Answers
56 mins confidence: peer agreement (net): +5
literally preventing him from getting out of the bath
Explanation: Although she might possibly not have been continuously physically restraining him, that is certainly at least partially the implication here.
Remember that in a salt or Epsom salts bath, he would have greater buoyancy, and so it would help him anyway to stay submerged if his mother actually held him down.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 57 minutes (2016-12-09 05:59:14 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Your meaning #1
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 7 heures (2016-12-09 12:04:37 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
I think as Gallagy says, it's a bit of both, really... certainly as I said, I don't think it would be a case of 'physical restraint', but as Charles says, perhaps her physical presence to help him stick at it.
Tony M France Local time: 16:16 Works in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 309
peer agreement (net): +5