How might I say to manage to do something (on time)?

Question

I hope you could help me to find out if there exists any specific verb in Spanish for the following situations.

1. Imagine a train station, the train is already there and is about to leave the station. You are hurrying to catch the train before it leaves. In the last moment you manage to hop onto the train just before the door shuts. What a lucky day!
   2. You are crossing the street (not at a crosswalk to make it more dramatic) and out of the blue a car is heading in your direction at a high speed. You manage to step on the sidewalk just before the car passes you. Again, such a luck!

The idea that there is a moment after that everything goes bad and you manage to do something under time pressure.

I'm sure that it is correct to use conseguir or lograr to express the idea, For instance

Esta mañana he conseguido coger el tren. (Antes de que saliera de la estación)

Ayer logré cruzar la calle. (Antes de que el coche me atropellara)

What I'm not sure is that just saying he conseguido coger el tren without the part within the parentheses doesn't mean that I did manage to catch it having little time and yet I did it. he conseguido coger el tren without clarifying could mean, for example, that I had much time to get onto the train, but there were so many people that I literally squeezed in - ¡lo he conseguido!. You see? Without the context both conseguir or lograr could mean anything you could imagine but the real situation. And so I end up saying logré cruzar la calle justo delante del coche.

Out of curiosity, is there a verb to express the idea that I managed to do something having little time to do it? Or should I say "conseguir/lograr do something before something else happen"?

Answer 1

The idiomatic expression you're looking for is me las arreglé.
Note that the verb changes depending of the subject:

Te las arreglaste para subir al tren ...
Me las arreglé para subir al tren ...
Se las arregló para subir al tren ...

And yes, this expression is used when something goes bad and you pulled it off anyway.

Answer 2

To manage to do something, you can use either of these:

• conseguir hacer algo.
• lograr hacer algo.

No cabe duda.

Answer 3

In Mexican spanish, at least, we use the verb alcanzar.

Esta mañana alcancé a tomar el tren (antes de que saliera de la estación).

Ayer alcancé a cruzar la calle (antes de que el coche me atropellara).

¿Alcanzas a terminar este trabajo antes de salir de vacaciones?

Answer 4

In Spain for Situation 1 you can also hear the expression:

• Me las apañé para llegar a tiempo al tren
• Se las apañó para llegar a tiempo al tren
• Se las ha apañado (él) para llegar a tiempo al tren

This last way is very colloquial. May be not as common as arreglé, but still used.

Anyaways your first two proposals were right. Everybody would understand it

Answer 5

The different suggestions made until now (arreglar, apañar and alcanzar) are right in the sense that they convey the meaning of to manage to do something, but they are general, and do not specifically imply a limited time factor.

I am not aware of an equivalence in Spanish. I think being in a hurry is something we just don't do. :)

Now, for the real, I think you will need to use an idiom like the ones suggested in the comments, or you can get creative with "me ha faltado el bigote de una gamba" (since shrimp whiskers are really thin), or "me ha ido más justo que un dedo en el culo" (work yourself the meaning of this one).