pump someone's tires

pump someone's tires verb: to praise, encourage, or vigorously support someone.

Verb

pump someone's tires (third-person singular simple present pumps someone's tires, present participle pumping someone's tires, simple past and past participle pumped someone's tires)

(Canada, idiomatic) To praise, encourage, or vigorously support someone.
- "I'm sure (Toronto coach) Greg Gilbert is going to pump their tires with the fact they've beat us six times."2009 April 14, Canadian Press, "AHL leaders in regular season, Manitoba prepares for series with Toronto," The Hockey News (Canada) (retrieved 1 Feb 2017)
- Now, with Suisham enjoying a career season, those in his hometown are pumping his tires.2012 December 8, Mike Zeisberger, “Football: Canadian kid Suisham has been money for Steelers”, in Toronto Sun, Canada, retrieved 01 Feb 2017

third-person singular present	pumps someone's tires
present participle	pumping someone's tires
past participle	pumped someone's tires
past	pumped someone's tires
alternative form	pump up someone's tires

What does pump someone's tires mean?: Pump someone's tires means to praise, encourage, or vigorously support someone.
What part of speech is pump someone's tires?: Pump someone's tires is a verb.
What is the past tense of pump someone's tires?: The past tense of pump someone's tires is pumped someone's tires.

Adapted from Wiktionary: pump someone's tires (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-pump someone's tires.wav.

Cite this entry: “pump someone's tires.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pump_someone%27s_tires. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.