Problem:
In , let be the point on side such that . The line intersects the circumcircle of again at point . Prove that one of the common tangents of the circumcircles of and is parallel to .
Problem:
In , let be the point on side such that . The line intersects the circumcircle of again at point . Prove that one of the common tangents of the circumcircles of and is parallel to .
Solution:
Refer to the figure shown below:
Let and be the midpoints of and respectively. We claim that is the desired common tangent. To prove this, let and be the orthogonal projections of and onto . Note that and are the midpoints of and respectively. Now we claim that . To see this, note that
Similarly, we can prove that . Thus, to prove the claim, it suffices to prove that . This is because
This proves the first claim.
Next, we claim that is the desired common tangent. Note that from the first claim, is a rectangle, since and are both right angles. Let and be the circumcenters of triangles and respectively. Then , so since we get . Likewise, as well, which proves the second claim.
It then follows that is the desired common tangent parallel to , and the required conclusion follows.