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Geometry Difficulty 8.4 Shortlist Prove it United States

Let ABCDABCD be a cyclic quadrilateral, and let E,F,GE, F, G, and HH be the midpoints of AB,BC,CDAB, BC, CD, and DADA, respectively. Let W,X,YW, X, Y, and ZZ be the orthocenters of triangles AHE,BEF,CFGAHE, BEF, CFG, and DGHDGH, respectively. Prove that quadrilaterals ABCDABCD and WXYZWXYZ have the same area.
(This problem was suggested by Zhonghao Ye)

Solution

Lemma. Let ABCDABCD be any quadrilateral with E,F,G,HE, F, G, H the midpoints of sides AB,BC,CD,DAAB, BC, CD, DA, respectively. Then [ABCD]=2[EFGH][ABCD] = 2[EFGH].
Proof. Let PP be the intersection of diagonals ACAC and BDBD. HEHE is the midline of triangle ABDABD so HEHE bisects segment APAP. It follows that 2[HPE]=[AHPE]2[HPE] = [AHPE]. Similarly, we obtain 2[EPF]=[BEPF]2[EPF] = [BEPF], 2[FPG]=[CFPG]2[FPG] = [CFPG], and 2[GPH]=[DGPH]2[GPH] = [DGPH]. Summing these up yields the desired result. \square

Let OO denote the circumcenter of ABCDABCD, and let P,Q,R,SP, Q, R, S denote the midpoints of HE,EF,FG,GHHE, EF, FG, GH respectively. Applying the lemma to ABCDABCD and then EFGHEFGH, we get [ABCD]=2[EFGH]=4[PQRS][ABCD] = 2[EFGH] = 4[PQRS].

We have WHOEWH\parallel OE since they are both perpendicular to ABAB, and similarly WEOHWE\parallel OH, so WHOEWHOE is a parallelogram. It follows that WW is the image of the midpoint of PP (i.e. the midpoint of HEHE) under dilation from OO by a factor of 22. Similarly X,Y,ZX, Y, Z are the images of R,S,TR, S, T under the same transformation, so WXYZWXYZ is the image of PQRSPQRS under a dilation of factor 22. Thus, it follows that [WXYZ]=4[PQRS]=[ABCD][WXYZ] = 4[PQRS] = [ABCD] as desired.

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