ripping

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of rip.

   He spent an hour ripping old carpet out of the hallway.

   Ripping the letter open, she scanned the first line.

   Note

   One spelling does two grammatical jobs. After a form of be it is the participle (she was ripping the seam); as subject or object it is the gerund (ripping old carpet takes patience). Either way it can carry any use of rip: tearing fabric, wrenching something out, tearing along at speed, or sawing with the grain, which is the cut that leaves the woodworker's lumber behind.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The process of copying audio or video content from a disc, such as a CD or DVD, onto a hard disk.

   Ripping the box set to her hard drive preserved the films in high quality.

   Before streaming, ripping was how many people built their digital music libraries.

   Similarcopying, extraction

3. 3
   adjective

   Capable of tearing, or able to be removed by being torn away.

   The ripping seam gave way the moment she pulled the package open.

   A ripping panel along the side let the crate be opened without tools.

4. 4
   noununcountable

   Lumber that has been cut lengthwise, parallel to the grain of the wood.

   The carpenter sorted the ripping by thickness before assembly.

   Fresh ripping from the saw still smelled of pine.

   Note

   This is a woodworker's term for the stock that comes off the saw when a board is cut along its length, with the grain rather than across it. It names the material, not the act. Used uncountably it means lumber of this kind in general (a stack of ripping). Used countably it means individual strips, and the plural is rippings.

5. 5
   noununcountable

   In bodybuilding, a regimen of diet and exercise aimed at stripping away body fat to display the muscle underneath.

   Competitive bodybuilders rely on ripping in the final weeks before a show.

   Ripping requires a strict caloric deficit alongside heavy resistance training.

   Similarcutting

   Oppositebulking

   Note

   Gym vocabulary for the leaning-out phase of a training cycle. The aim is to strip body fat while keeping the muscle already built, so that definition shows. It pairs a caloric deficit with resistance training and typically falls in the weeks before a physique competition. Bodybuilders speak of it the way they speak of other training phases, as something one is in or doing.

6. 6
   nounAustraliauncountable

   The plowing of a rabbit warren with deep furrows as a means of feral pest control.

   Ripping destroyed the network of tunnels beneath the paddock.

   Landholders turned to ripping after baiting failed to reduce the rabbit numbers.

   Note

   An Australian term from rabbit control. Here the plow itself is the tool: deep furrows are driven straight through the warren, so the burrows are destroyed rather than baited or trapped. Landholders use it as a process noun, usually without an article, alongside methods like baiting, as part of feral-pest management.

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