请看相关报道:Overwhelming favorite Wang Meng won China the first gold medal in Turin, holding off Bulgaria's Evgenia Radanova by the length of a skate in the women's 500-meter short track final Wednesday night.
hold off 表示keep at a distance; resist,是"保持距离,不接近"的意思,和keep off是近义词组。
除了上面的意思外,hold off表示stop or delay doing something,如:The board of directors will hold off making a decision until next Wednesday.(董事会将推迟到下星期三才作出决定。)这个词组还有个意思是"使离开,延缓到",如:Will the rain hold off until after the game? (这场雨能拖到比赛结束之后再下吗?)
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