📚no holds barred March 25, 2021

✍🏾Meaning

If something is done with no holds barred, it's done without restriction, rules or restraint.

❗️For example

🔸The final game was played with no holds barred. It was very rough football and the referee had a hard time keeping control of things.

🔸The election campaign turned into a no-holds-barred battle with each candidate trying to find information with which to damage their opponent's reputation.

✏️Note

If this idiom is used before a noun, hyphens should be added, as in "a no-holds-barred contest".

▫️Origin

From the sport of wrestling, in which certain dangerous holds are not usually allowed. But if wrestlers are in a no-holds-barred contest, there are no restrictions and they can use whatever holds they like.