Today's OED antedating: "the stretch"

Stretch, figurative/transferred, the final and most important part of a competition, ex horseracing (n., sec 8 (c), first use cited 1949): Book titled The Short-Stop, by Zane Grey, 1909, ch xiv, p 247: "The team broke even on the trip, a satisfactory showing to Mac. 'Shure, we're restin' up fer the break into the stretch,' he said."