arrancar

A very common verb covering both the literal (to pull out/uproot — arrancar una mala hierba, to pull out a weed) and mechanical (to start an engine — el coche no arranca, the car won't start) senses, plus the figurative (to extract, wrest — le arrancó una promesa, she wrung a promise out of him).

• El coche no arrancaba con este frío. — The car wouldn't start in this cold.
• Arrancó la mala hierba del jardín antes de plantar las flores. — She pulled out the weeds from the garden before planting the flowers.
• Le arrancaron una confesión tras horas de interrogatorio. — They wrung a confession out of him after hours of interrogation.

Using arrancar for a person literally starting to walk or run without the sense of an abrupt, forceful beginning — arrancar implies suddenness (an engine catching, a race starting with a burst), unlike the neutral empezar a caminar/correr.

• song Arráncame la vida — Classic bolero by Mexican composer Agustín Lara ("Tear my life away"), one of the best-known songs in his catalog, later lending its title to Ángeles Mastretta's acclaimed 1985 novel of the same name.
• book Arráncame la vida — Ángeles Mastretta's 1985 debut novel, winner of the Mazatlán Literature Prize and a major bestseller across the Spanish-speaking world, translated into fifteen languages and adapted into a film in 2008.