After matches in a championship a team had exactly of wins, where are positive integers. What is the least for which it is possible that after -st match the team had exactly of wins?
Solution
It follows from the conditions of the problem that after matches the team had wins, such that . Then, the following has to hold: .
The first equation implies , and so has to divide .
The second equation implies .
Hence . Moreover, . Therefore, has to divide . Since and the numbers and are relatively prime and less than , one of the numbers has to be divisible by , and the other by . Clearly, the smallest such number is . Thus, and . It is easy to check that
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