run rings around

Idioms and Phrases

Also, run circles around . Be markedly superior to, as in Ethan runs rings around David in chess , or In spelling, Karen runs circles around her classmates . The first term, dating from the late 1800s, alludes to a horse running around a riding ring much faster than the others.

Example Sentences

During his 11 years in power, Mr Maduro has managed to run rings around the opposition time and time again, aided by the fact that opposition leaders often seemed to spend more time attacking each other than concentrating on beating him.

From BBC

Edward C. Stone, the visionary physicist who dispatched NASA’s Voyager spacecraft to run rings around our solar system’s outer planets and, for the first time, to venture beyond to unravel interstellar mysteries, died on Sunday at his home in Pasadena, Calif. He was 88.

From New York Times

Money like that made it easy to run rings around law enforcement.

From Literature

Seventeen years after the end of the animated series that made toddlers seem smarter than their parents, ringleader Tommy Pickles, nervous Chuckie Finster and bossy Angelica Pickles now have smart technology to run rings around the hapless grown-ups who are supposed to be in charge.

From Reuters

Samsung’s tablets likely run rings around the Tab P11 Pro with its Snapdragon 865 Plus processor and 8GB of RAM.

From The Verge

Related Words

• counter
• curb
• elude
• frustrate
• hinder
• nullify
• prevent
• thwart