to pip to the post
- phrasal verb
- UK
- After trailing for most of the match, she managed to pip to the post in the final seconds.
Examples
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He was disappointed to be pipped to the post after leading the race for so long.
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Did she really pip to the post last week?
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The underdog team pipped to the post their rivals with a last-minute goal.
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He pipped to the post in the final seconds!
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After trailing for most of the match, she managed to pip to the post in the final seconds.
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The underdog team pipped to the post their rivals with a last-minute goal.
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He was disappointed to be pipped to the post after leading the race for so long.
Synonyms
49
3.8
Defeat others in a contest to win a job or prize
To beat someone by a very small margin
Antonyms
How Close
Surface Forms
Morphology
The verb 'pip' already encodes the idea of edging out an opponent by a very small margin, so a learner who knows that sense could infer the overall meaning; however the collocation 'to the post' (meaning at the finish/last moment) is somewhat idiomatic and relies on a less common sense of 'post' that many learners may not know. Because part of the meaning comes directly from a constituent while the temporal/finish-line nuance is idiomatic and regionally used, the expression is only partially predictable.
Etymology
Pip to the post may come from old horse racing: the post was the 'finish line' and to pip someone was to beat them by a tiny amount at that post. So the phrase means 'to narrowly defeat' someone at the last moment.