Meaning
An advantage gained by beginning earlier than others, whether as extra time, prior experience, or a better starting position. It applies literally to races and games and figuratively to education, careers, and projects. Neutral register; equally at home in sport, business, and education. Regional use: General English.
Origin
Merriam-Webster dates the first known use to 1859, defining the term as an advantage granted or achieved at the beginning of a race, a chase, or a competition, and Christine Ammer's idiom dictionary places it in the second half of the 1800s. The phrase is often said to derive from horse racing, where margins are still measured in heads and necks and where a weaker horse could be started in front in a handicap, but neither of the references verified here states that derivation, so it should be treated as plausible rather than proven. What is documented is that the compound was established in mid-19th-century sporting vocabulary and soon broadened to mean any early advantage in life or work.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- a head start on the competition
- get a head start
- give someone a head start
- have a head start
Usage Examples
- Leaving at dawn gave the removal crew a head start on the traffic.
- Fluent Spanish gave her a head start when the firm opened its Mexico City office.
- If we finish the outline tonight, we will have a head start on the report.