Horse Racing Explained: What Is a Dead Heat?
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Horse racing has many different terms to measure margin of victory. Going from closest to largest, a horse can win by a nose, head, or neck, by fractions of a length, or by a length or more (a length is, as you might guess, the estimated length of a racehorse, roughly eight feet).
But sometimes, there is no margin to measure – the horses reach the finish line equally together. When that happens, the familiar term “dead heat” is applied, usually after a several-minute wait while the racetrack stewards examine the finish line photo.