初赛 (chū sài) — preliminary round; first round (of a competitio…

Definition

noun

preliminary roundfirst round (of a competition)

初赛，。
Tā cān jiā le zhè cì bǐ sài de chū sài, shùn lì jìn rù le jué sài.
He participated in the preliminary round of this competition and smoothly advanced to the finals.
初赛。
Xué xiào yǎn jiǎng bǐ sài de chū sài jiāng zài xià zhōu jǔ xíng.
The preliminary round of the school speech contest will be held next week.
初赛。
Hěn duō xuǎn shǒu zài chū sài jiù bèi táo tài le.
Many contestants were eliminated already in the preliminary round.

Compound word

构词法gòucífǎ

偏正piānzhèngModifier + head

The first part narrows down the second: it says what kind of thing the head is.

赛sàicompetition

初 means first and 赛 means competition, together the first round.

Characters in this word

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

衤刀初

初 combines 衤 (clothes) and 刀 (knife), showing the start of making clothes by cutting cloth.

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 賽; 赛 is its simplified writing.

Meaning part形符xíngfú

貝貝bèishell

Sound part声符shēngfú

塞

Same sound today

The traditional form 賽 uses 貝 (shell) for meaning and 塞 for sound. The simplified 赛 is a later shorthand.