slot
n.— «While powerlifting, which combines lifts in three disciplines—the squat, dead lift and bench press—appears to be all about brute force, it was actually a game of milimetres where subtle changes in technique could make a massive difference in performance, Jenkins said. In powerllifting parlance, it’s called getting “in the slot.” “You’ve got to be in what we call “the slot,” and if you aren’t in there then you aren’t even close. It’s her ability to get into the slot and get into it early that’s so much better this time around.”» —“Buckley powers back in record-breaking form” by Nathan Burdon Southland Times (Invercargill, New Zealand) Apr. 25, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
It was a dark and stormy night. So begins the long and increasingly convoluted prose of Edwards Bulwer-Lytton’s best-known novel. Today the annual Bulwer-Lytton Contest asks contestants for fanciful first sentences that are similarly...
Ron in Gloverville, South Carolina, wonders about the phrase since hatchet was hammer, which some use to mean “for a long period of time,” as in My family has lived here since hatchet was hammer. Another phrase he’s heard indicating the same thing...
I’ve heard naval aviators talk about a slot, a narrow envelope of flight paths that can lead to a successful carrier landing. Miss the slot (too high/low, too fast/slow, etc.) and you’re wasting your time, or worse. Sounds like an analogy to the cited use.