Word
De jonge atleet rent de lange afstand het snelst.
Meaning
The young athlete runs the long distance the fastest.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Questions & Answers about De jonge atleet rent de lange afstand het snelst.
Why do we use het snelst instead of just snelst for "the fastest"?
When a superlative ("fastest", "best", "highest") is used to describe how an action is done (acting as an adverb modifying a verb like rent), Dutch requires the fixed phrase het + superlative. You cannot leave out het here.
Would het snelst change if the subject was plural, like "the young athletes"?
No, it remains exactly the same. When used as an adverb modifying a verb, het + superlative is invariant. It doesn't change to match the gender or number of the subject or object. So, "The young athletes run the fastest" would simply be De jonge atleten rennen het snelst.
Why do jonge and lange get an -e ending, but snelst doesn't?
Jonge and lange are adjectives placed directly before the nouns they describe (de atleet and de afstand). Because both are de-words, the adjectives get the -e ending. Snelst is not modifying a noun; it's part of the adverbial phrase het snelst modifying the verb rent, so it doesn't take an adjective ending.
Why does het snelst go at the very end of the sentence?