Dictionary of Spoken Russian/Russian-English/Section 26

§26. IRREGULAR VERBS

Most irregular verbs are peculiar only in that the inf stem and the pr stem do not match. Thus, держать "to hold" has the pr forms as of Class Four: держу, держит; the dictionary, by showing these forms, tells the whole story: imv держи, p держал, ppp подержанный. Similarly, чуять "to scent" has the pr stem [čuy-]: чую, чует; this indication suffices: imv чуй, p чуял, чуяла.

All other irregularities are cited in the dictionary and require no comment here; we name some of the more frequent ones in §§27, 28, 29. When the dictionary cites irregular forms between slanted lines, this means that the regular forms are also used.