Fig. 5. The IRC for the SN2 system. Structures A, B, and D represent the reactant, transition state, and product structures (after the fluoride ion orbits the system to hydrogen bond with the hydroxyl group), respectively. Structure C represents the structure where PC2 is at a minimum (Fig. 6), which can be thought of as the structure of the system when the fluoride ion has fully dissociated from the methanol, but has not yet come back to hydrogen bond with the hydroxyl group.
