Walk over

A walkover or W.O. (originally two words: "walk over") is the awarding of a victory to a contestant because there are no other contestants or the other contestants have been disqualified or have forfeited. The term can apply in sport but also to elections, when it is also referred to as winning "by default". The word is used more generally by extension, particularly in politics, for a contest in which the winner is not the only participant but has little or no competition. The narrow and extended meanings of "walkover" as a single word are both found from 1829.

The word originates from horseracing in the United Kingdom, where an entrant in a one-horse race run under Jockey Club rules has at least to "walk over" the course before being awarded victory. This outcome was quite common at a time when there was no guaranteed prize money for horses finishing second or third, so there was no incentive to run a horse in a race it could not win. The eighteenth century champion racehorse Eclipse was so dominant over his contemporaries that he was allowed to walk over on nine occasions, and the 1828 Epsom Derby winner Cadland walked over on at least six occasions.

The term is also used in tennis, in reference to a player's unopposed victory as a result of the opponent's failing to start the match for any reason, such as injury.

The only Olympic Games walkover for a gold medal was at the 1908 Summer Olympics: Wyndham Halswelle won a rerun of the 400 m race as the two other athletes refused to take part in the rerun.

The only time it has happened at the FIFA World Cup was in the 1938 edition, when Austria was invaded and occupied by Germany just before the former was to play Sweden. After the England team declined to take Austria's entry, FIFA gave Sweden a walkover.

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