rack 1
noun
- Plenty of magazines line the racks in the grocery stores.
- Knowing your store has a magazine rack with a fresh selection of popular titles gives your customers yet another reason to stop by.
- This autumn you will have to wade through Harris Tweed fashion features in the top style magazines and on the racks of the most expensive designer stores.
- And if you prefer to send cards the slow way, many stores have racks of red valentine cards on offer in their stationery department.
- Books were sold mostly on wire racks in drug stores and supermarkets.
- Seen on the glossy racks of a record store it's genuinely shocking.
- Tops that look like kurtas hang on the racks in departmental stores in the hip Soho neighborhood of Manhattan.
- Before you buy the clothes off the racks at the store, someone decides to put them there.
- Move coffee tables, magazine racks and plant stands from high-traffic areas.
- And if you buy a spice rack with containers, make sure they're what you want.
- For years characters like these ruled corner store comic racks across North America, earning a loyal fan base and selling hundreds of thousands of copies each month.
- She takes me across to one of the dried food stores where, in racks of jars behind the counter, are birds' nests waiting for their moment in soup.
- They walked around the store and found a rack of clothes.
- It's encased in clear plastic as if it has just been pulled from the rack at a drug store.
- I also bought three of these spice racks, which stack into one tower that takes up a lot less space in my tiny apartment.
- Some useful household articles such as letter racks, trays and wooden ladles are also on display.
- The mouse was almost as scared of me as I was of it (it could never have been as scared) and ran for cover under a spice rack.
- Today, the rack is full of magazines on every fitness subject and activity.
- Perhaps it's best to visit when you need to restock your wine rack.
- Thus, north of Kota Bharu, we turned off the main road into a fishing community where the larger freshly landed fish were cleaned and put out to dry on acres of bamboo racks.
- Glenn Jones totes a collection of obscure vintage guitars behind a huge rack of FX units seemingly fashioned from some drawers and a Zimmer frame.
- ‘Where is the Line’ is a mishmash of ideas, sounding like a fight between a choir and a rack of effects boxes, with neither winning.
- There were none of the backing tapes, racks of digital effects and other complex electronic gadgetry of which Tony is so fond.
- Will Sergeant, head and hair down, concentrates on his guitar in his little corner behind a rack of effects.
- His Canadian tour consisted of the man himself, two racks of MIDI-controlled effects and a few old Macs running wireframe screensavers for the light show.
- Stalls should be equipped with a rack for hay, a trough or box for grain, and a water pail holder.
- We found that placing a bale rack inside the tank keeps cows and calves out of the tank.
- It's been done out rather stylishly, but still feels rustic, with original limewashed stone walls, and the stalls and hay rack are still there.
- Engines had a cogged pinion wheel that engaged the rack, helping them climb the slopes.
- The steering rack on a car without power steering has just two pieces: the rack and the pinion gear.
- Coupling rods from this main axle also provide power to the two pairs of carrying wheels, through which the power is transmitted where the rack is not in use.
- We now find, after only 29,000 miles, one suspension strut was loose in its housing and the steering rack is shot and needs replacing.
- Changes and improvements have also been made to the steering, which gets a quicker rack and revised power assistance pump.
- The steering system is lighter and more compact than a steering column and rack and the brakes occupy the same space as a conventional caliper.
- The fast steering rack is much appreciated here with only minute adjustments required to keep the car steady rather than sawing at the wheel.
- Maxima also gets an upgraded steering rack to refine steering feel.
- Oversized ventilated discs in all four corners and an aluminum steering rack ensure precise handling and braking.
- The quicker and more sensitive steering rack makes has a major plus side, though: racecar-sharp turn-in.
- When we finally emerged from the cave after an eight-hour trip it was as if we had spent the last eight hours on that medieval instrument of torture, the rack.
- One is not bound to regard torture as only present in a mediaeval dungeon where the appliances of rack and thumbscrew or similar devices were employed.
- Confessions were extracted and signed on the rack, and used in the place of truth.
- Megan put her and Alysha's balls in the racks.
- The balls are gathered in the triangle rack with the black eight-ball in the middle.
- If you fail in the first rack of the inning, the inning is over.
- I've seen Don run over 40 racks in nine ball, says Fred Whalen.
- I ran three racks, missed one ball, and got beat five to four.
- I once told a student to shoot twenty racks of balls every day.
- Then proceed to run out the rack, finishing with the eight ball.
- Bulls and cows in the Tsaatan herd grow velvety racks of antlers.
- Such skulls, with their enormous racks of antlers, adorn the walls of castles and hunting lodges throughout Ireland.
- An adjoining room is littered with mementos of more recent island history: a rack of antlers, a rusty plow, and an old dentist's chair.
- As we departed, the family's teenage son rode up on a reindeer, its fuzzy rack of antlers almost bigger than he.
- One summer morning a rack of antlers was visible in the distant meadow where the night before a pack of 14 wolves had taken down a bull elk.
- If we clone deer at all, rather than their racks, we should select animals for duplication based on their ability to get through a rough winter or survive a drought.
- They ‘hot-bunk’ - sharing the use of a rack with a shipmate working an alternate watch.
- One morning during a heavy rain we shoved our racks to the bulkheads and turned our barracks into a mini-drill-field and practiced close order drill.
verb
[with object]- The very instant he touched it, his whole body was wracked by pain.
- He blinked as pain wracked his body and paralyzed him momentarily.
- The anguish that she felt came pouring out and she cried, shuddering as the sobs wracked her body.
- He felt helpless as he watched her fight against the pain that was racking her body.
- But all the authorities are agreed that the worst aspects of crucifixion were the raging thirst and the excruciating cramps that racked the victim till he died.
- He is wracked by fear and exhibits signs of having been tortured.
- I was wracked by conflicting feelings this Tuesday.
- You're wracked now because you cannot make amends.
- Back home he is racked by paranoia, loneliness and inextinguishable desire for Simone.
- By 9.30 I was kneeling beside the phone and the pains were now bringing tears to my eyes but bizarrely I was still racked with doubt.
- All of the way home I was racked with curiosity - What was in the briefcase?
- I must admit that the week before we left I was wracked by anxiety over the idea of crossing the ocean, but in fact, once we were under way it was fine.
- Of course, now that I'm here, I'm suddenly wracked with uncertainty.
- We only have about 5 weeks now until you come home and already I am racked with both apprehension and happiness.
- Then he tells me that he is racked by self-doubt and is never satisfied with the interviews he has conducted.
- His fight continues, even when the dreaded disease racks him.
- In the seventies we were racked with economic problems like huge inflation and double-digit unemployment.
- I was racked with convulsions as I tried to muffle the incessant hacking by stuffing my scarf in my mouth.
- She is racked by irrational guilt that she survived and Hassan did not.
- In a city racked by violence for a week, there was yet another shootout on Sunday.
- He also was into voyeurism and bondage, it seems, and liked nothing more than to watch naked men being racked and tortured in the dungeons.
- But here, the storage space is maximised with a built in rail and an ingenious shoe racking system.
- She racked the mike and went back to where Riley lay pale and still on the wet tarmac.
- Hey, I have a record out, too, and they rack it in the same rack.
- On Wednesday, cues were racked up for the last time at Metropool on the Lower Main.
- Consequently, there is a need to consider the best ways to move the product, rack it, and package it.
- At that point, rack the sled and move on to the next exercise.
Usage
The relationship between the forms rack and wrack is complicated. The most common noun sense of rack, ‘a framework for holding and storing things’, is always spelled rack, never wrack. In the phrase rack something up the word is also always spelled rack. Figurative senses of the verb, deriving from the type of torture in which someone is stretched on a rack, can, however, be spelled either rack or wrack: thus ‘racked with guilt’ or ‘wracked with guilt’; ‘rack your brains’ or ‘wrack your brains’. In addition, the phrase rack and ruin can also be spelled wrack and ruin
Phrases
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1
go to rack and ruin
- (also go to wrack and ruin) gradually deteriorate in condition because of neglect; fall into disrepair.rack from Old English wræc 'vengeance'; related to wreakExample sentences
- It went to rack and ruin 200 years later, but has now been carefully restored.
- Over the last decade, it has gone to rack and ruin and is now a haunt for bikers and four-wheel-drive vehicles.
- At the time I was thinking I have to stop this self - indulgent idea of being a writer because my life is going to wrack and ruin and I can't afford it.
- Old people think the world is going to wrack and ruin, the young are optimistic.
- He said: ‘They have let the park go to rack and ruin.’
- The owners of such buildings are obliged by law now to maintain them - they cannot be allowed to go to rack and ruin under any circumstances, and renovation work on these buildings will be constrained to some extent for obvious reasons.
- There is nothing around here for the youngsters to do, everything has been allowed to go to rack and ruin.
- I don't understand how anyone can afford to let a house go to rack and ruin.
- We are told about a man whose life went to wrack and ruin because of his gambling.
- Neither of them won in the summer, so does that mean they're now going to go to rack and ruin?
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2
off the rack
- mainly North American English (of clothes) ready-made rather than made to order; off the peg.Example sentences
- They were sophisticated, not the kind of ones you buy off the rack.
- Like me, they buy their clothes off the rack.
- Don't get yourself depressed searching for items of clothing that will fit you perfectly off the rack.
- Her wedding dress, bought two days before her marriage, was off the rack.
- Rosen, no slouch himself, has clothes made for him in Italy and buys off the rack, as well.
- I can buy clothes off the rack.
- I found out that if I ever was to dress like a woman, I would not be buying off the rack.
- The dress was bought off the rack as a late addition to her wardrobe.
- Nothing you buy off the rack will ever look as good on you as something made for you.
- If off the rack, where were they purchased and for how much?
-
3
on the rack
- suffering intense distress or strain.Synonymsunder pressure, under stress, under a strain, in distress;suffering, going through torture, in agony, in pain, racked with pain;in trouble, in difficulties, having problems
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4
rack one's brain
- (also rack one's brains or wrack one's brain) make a great effort to think of or remember something: Meg racked her brain for inspirationMore example sentences
- You're wracking your brains to try and remember Alan's wonderful effort now, aren't you?
- But eventually the day was at an end… and I had to rack my brains to remember where the car was.
- I walk towards him, wracking my brains to remember how I know him, or at the very least, a name.
- He racked his brain, trying to remember, but couldn't.
- She racked her brain to remember if she had met anyone with that name.
- Quite frankly, I had to rack my brains to remember my first kiss.
- Unfortunately, a lot of the details dissolved from my memory as soon as I got up, and I've been wracking my brain trying to remember exactly what was going on.
- I was wracking my brain this morning to remember his name.
- I'm racking my brains as best I can but I can't remember any meetings.
- I racked my brains but, oddly enough, I couldn't remember a single one.
think hard, put one's mind to something, give much thought to something, concentrate, try to remember, puzzle over something, cudgel one's brains, furrow one's browinformal scratch one's head
Phrasal verbs
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rack up
- (rack something up, rack up something) accumulate or achieve something, typically a score or amount: Japan is racking up record trade surpluses with the United StatesMore example sentences
- And he's racked up a record of 19-0, making him the local star.
- But just in his first term he's racked up about two-thirds that much money in new debt.
- They racked up more points in the new year then any other club, he says.
- Even so, the company has already racked up annual sales of more than $5 million.
- He racked up a hefty debt in the process - more than $12,000.
- In fact, there's more opportunity than ever for your company to rack up record sales.
- Labour MSPs have not been shy about racking up large taxi bills on the public purse.
- We spent months racking up the phone bills, sending each other surprise packages and sentimental handwritten letters.
- And when Sligo started to rack up some late scores, these fears again seemed justified.
achieve, attain, accomplish, gain, earn, win, succeed in making, reach, make, get, obtain;accumulate, amass;score, tally, record, register, loginformal chalk up, clock up, knock up, notch up, turn in, bag
Origin
Middle English: from Middle Dutch rec, Middle Low German rek 'horizontal bar or shelf', probably from recken 'to stretch, reach' (possibly the source of rack (sense 1 of the verb)1).
The rack is the name of a medieval instrument of torture. It consisted of a frame on which a victim was stretched by turning rollers to which their wrists and ankles were tied. To rack someone was to torture them on this device, and from this we get rack your brains (late 16th century) to mean ‘to make a great effort to think of or remember something’. The rack (Middle English) that you stand things on is related, and both come from German rek ‘horizontal bar or shelf’. This is not, however, the origin of winemaking rack meaning ‘draw off from the sediment’ (Late Middle English). This is from Provençal arracar, from raca ‘stems and husks of grapes, dregs’. Another use of rack (late 16th century) represents yet another word. When something deteriorates through neglect we may say that it is going to rack and ruin. Rack here is a variant spelling of wrack, meaning ‘destruction’ and is related to wreck.
Words that rhyme with rack
aback, alack, attack, back, black, brack, clack, claque, crack, Dirac, drack, flack, flak, hack, jack, Kazakh, knack, lack, lakh, mac, mach, Nagorno-Karabakh, pack, pitchblack, plaque, quack, sac, sack, shack, shellac, slack, smack, snack, stack, tach, tack, thwack, track, vac, wack, whack, wrack, yak, ZackFor editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: rack
Definition of rack in:
- US English dictionary
- English synonyms
- US English synonyms
rack 2
noun
verb
- She of course has no memory whatsoever of the entire incident, and tells him to rack off.
- The class was laughing hysterically and Bree whirled around and yelled at them to rack off.
Origin
mid 16th century: of unknown origin.
The rack is the name of a medieval instrument of torture. It consisted of a frame on which a victim was stretched by turning rollers to which their wrists and ankles were tied. To rack someone was to torture them on this device, and from this we get rack your brains (late 16th century) to mean ‘to make a great effort to think of or remember something’. The rack (Middle English) that you stand things on is related, and both come from German rek ‘horizontal bar or shelf’. This is not, however, the origin of winemaking rack meaning ‘draw off from the sediment’ (Late Middle English). This is from Provençal arracar, from raca ‘stems and husks of grapes, dregs’. Another use of rack (late 16th century) represents yet another word. When something deteriorates through neglect we may say that it is going to rack and ruin. Rack here is a variant spelling of wrack, meaning ‘destruction’ and is related to wreck.
For editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: rack
Definition of rack in:
- US English dictionary
- English synonyms
- US English synonyms
rack 3
noun
- The oven-roasted rack of lamb, basted with butter and meat juice during the cooking process, was tender, juicy and firm, and served on a bed of sautéd beans.
- Nothing on the list of entrées cracks the $18 mark, despite the presence of sirloin steak, rack of lamb, trout, and salmon dishes.
- One butcher I spoke to said that you simply could not trim a loin of pork like a rack of lamb.
- This year sees the addition of an outdoor wood-fired oven in which to cook racks of Sussex lamb and Newhaven lobsters.
- Mutton chops are still on the top of the menu, followed by broiled filet mignon, rack of lamb and a thick, crusty veal chop smothered in wild mushrooms.
- For dinner parties, people go for racks of lamb or veal rather than a roast.
- My rack of lamb was baked to perfection and nestled on a bed of peppered savoy and sliced potatoes, augmented by a delicious rosemary and orange jus.
- A rack of lamb was like the best sort of outdoor barbecue, rosy, tender with deliciously charred bits that had to be gnawed off the bone.
- With racks of lamb at superb value, as always, you should get one, cut out the individual chops, coat them with honey and mustard and pop them on the barbecue.
- Two lamb rib racks, joined, are enough for a table of eight or fewer.
- The rack of lamb, which I had at a subsequent visit, was four reasonable cutlets, again pink and tender, with a pleasant flavour imparted by the honey and mustard crust.
- I've always thought a rack of lamb was the most romantic of meals.
- And delicious as it is, the rack of lamb seems unnervingly out of place on a menu alongside sesame noodles.
- The rack of lamb was crusted with bay leaf and paprika, and expertly sliced at the table in the classic Continental style.
- He made a diced bacon, sun-dried tomato and grated Stilton salad, followed by a rack of lamb on a bed of sweet potatoes with roasted vegetables.
- The most popular item on the menu is the rack of lamb with port and redcurrant sauce.
- Try the mouth-watering rack of lamb with Yorkshire pudding and rosemary jus - superb food in a superb country.
- The food was excellent, and I highly recommend the rack of lamb if it is on the menu.
- The roast beef was a little on the dry side, but the other racks of meat were well prepared.
- If you're cooking for a lot of people, it makes sense to buy a rack of lamb and trim bits off it.
Origin
late 16th century: of unknown origin.
The rack is the name of a medieval instrument of torture. It consisted of a frame on which a victim was stretched by turning rollers to which their wrists and ankles were tied. To rack someone was to torture them on this device, and from this we get rack your brains (late 16th century) to mean ‘to make a great effort to think of or remember something’. The rack (Middle English) that you stand things on is related, and both come from German rek ‘horizontal bar or shelf’. This is not, however, the origin of winemaking rack meaning ‘draw off from the sediment’ (Late Middle English). This is from Provençal arracar, from raca ‘stems and husks of grapes, dregs’. Another use of rack (late 16th century) represents yet another word. When something deteriorates through neglect we may say that it is going to rack and ruin. Rack here is a variant spelling of wrack, meaning ‘destruction’ and is related to wreck.
For editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: rack
Definition of rack in:
- US English dictionary
- English synonyms
- US English synonyms
rack 4
verb
[with object]- After, and increasingly before, malolactic fermentation, the wine is racked into barrels made of French oak, often Limousin with the typical Bordeaux barrel being called a barrique.
- All three firms also sell wine refrigeration units and racking systems, which they ship all over the country.
- The firm has demolished an old loading bay and store in preparation for a building to house four fermenting vessels and a barrel racking system.
- The trick is to crush the grapes gently, then in short order, rack the juice off to a fermentation tank.
- The white is then scooped off the top and the wine racked or poured into a clean barrel.
- The barrels are topped up every week and racked every three months.
Origin
late 15th century: from Provençal arracar, from raca 'stems and husks of grapes, dregs'.
The rack is the name of a medieval instrument of torture. It consisted of a frame on which a victim was stretched by turning rollers to which their wrists and ankles were tied. To rack someone was to torture them on this device, and from this we get rack your brains (late 16th century) to mean ‘to make a great effort to think of or remember something’. The rack (Middle English) that you stand things on is related, and both come from German rek ‘horizontal bar or shelf’. This is not, however, the origin of winemaking rack meaning ‘draw off from the sediment’ (Late Middle English). This is from Provençal arracar, from raca ‘stems and husks of grapes, dregs’. Another use of rack (late 16th century) represents yet another word. When something deteriorates through neglect we may say that it is going to rack and ruin. Rack here is a variant spelling of wrack, meaning ‘destruction’ and is related to wreck.
For editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: rack
Definition of rack in:
- US English dictionary
- English synonyms
- US English synonyms
rack 5
Origin
Middle English (denoting a rush or collision): probably of Scandinavian origin; compare with Norwegian and Swedish dialect rak 'wreckage', from reka 'to drive'.
The rack is the name of a medieval instrument of torture. It consisted of a frame on which a victim was stretched by turning rollers to which their wrists and ankles were tied. To rack someone was to torture them on this device, and from this we get rack your brains (late 16th century) to mean ‘to make a great effort to think of or remember something’. The rack (Middle English) that you stand things on is related, and both come from German rek ‘horizontal bar or shelf’. This is not, however, the origin of winemaking rack meaning ‘draw off from the sediment’ (Late Middle English). This is from Provençal arracar, from raca ‘stems and husks of grapes, dregs’. Another use of rack (late 16th century) represents yet another word. When something deteriorates through neglect we may say that it is going to rack and ruin. Rack here is a variant spelling of wrack, meaning ‘destruction’ and is related to wreck.
For editors and proofreaders
Line breaks: rack
Definition of rack in:
- US English dictionary
- English synonyms
- US English synonyms
