# tailgate
## English
### Alternative forms

* tail-gate, tail gate

### Etymology

From tail +‎ gate.

### Pronunciation

* (UK, US) IPA: /ˈteɪlˌɡeɪt/
* Audio (Southern England):(file)

### Noun

tailgate (plural tailgates)
* (automotive) A hinged board or hatch at the rear of a vehicle that can be lowered for loading and unloading.
    Synonym: tailboard
** 2007, Stephen Linn, The Ultimate Tailgater's Racing Guide‎, →ISBN:When they first attached tailgates to cars, we were hooked. By the 1970s, wagons with names like Vista Cruiser and Town & Country sported tailgates as big as dining tables.
* (British) The hinged rear door of a hatchback.
* Either of the downstream gates in a canal lock.
    (Can we add an example for this sense?)
* (US) Ellipsis of tailgate party.
** 2013 November 8, Nancy M. Better, “Tailgating Gets Online Playbooks”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:The website was created by Harry St. John, a former college athlete who wanted to take the agony out of managing tailgates.
* (mining) A tunnel for drawing spent air away from the working face of a mine.
    Coordinate term: maingate

#### Coordinate terms

* midgate

#### Derived terms

* tailgate party

#### Translations
### Verb

tailgate (third-person singular simple present tailgates, present participle tailgating, simple past and past participle tailgated)
* (automotive, intransitive, transitive) To drive dangerously close behind another vehicle.
    That idiot has been tailgating me for the last five minutes.
** 2002 October 19, Helen Carter, “That's no lady - that's the heiress who taunted neighbours”, in The Guardian‎:She also tailgated them at high speed in her convertible yellow Mercedes.
** 2013 August 19, Chris Chambers, “Bad driving: what are we thinking?”, in The Guardian‎:Last week the UK government announced a crackdown on unsafe driving. From now on, those of us spotted tailgating or lane hogging will face on-the-spot fines of £100 and three penalty points.
* To follow another person through access control on their access, rather than on one’s own credentials, especially when entering a door controlled by a card reader.
    Synonyms: piggyback, draft
** 2018 September 10, “ABC tightens Sydney security after man allegedly infiltrates building and assaults employee”, in The Guardian‎:An email circulated to ABC employees says Gallagher is believed to have tailgated staff walking through the building’s high-security doors.
* (finance, of a broker) To privately purchase or sell a security immediately after trading in the same security for a client.
    Coordinate term: front run
* (US, intransitive) To have a tailgate party.
** 2013 September 29, Ken Belson, “The Tailgate Experience, British Style”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:The point, Goldstein discovered through a lot of long days hanging out in parking lots, is that tailgating — the gustatory madness, the multigenerational camaraderie, the decked-out vans — is as essential a part of football as the game itself.

#### Derived terms

* tailgater

#### See also

* security distance
* draft
* slipstream

### Further reading

* tailgate on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
* piggybacking (security) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
* tailgating on Wikipedia.Wikipedia