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Geometry Difficulty 5.4 AIME, harder Prove it Saudi Arabia

Let ABCABC be an acute, non-isosceles triangle with OO, HH as circumcenter and orthocenter, respectively. Prove that the nine-point circles of AHOAHO, BHOBHO, CHOCHO have two common points.

Solution

Let MM, NN, PP be the midpoints of BCBC, CACA, ABAB and DD be the projection of AA on BCBC. Denote (E)(E) as the Euler circle of ABC\triangle ABC; then MM, NN, PP, DD lie on (E)(E) and EE is the midpoint of OHOH. Similarly, let HaH_a, OaO_a be the midpoints of AHAH, AOAO and KK be the projection of AA on OHOH; then HaH_a, OaO_a, KK, EE lie on the Euler circle of AOH\triangle AOH.

Denote JJ as the symmetric point of KK through NPNP. Foremost, we will prove that JJ is the intersection of (KHaOa)(KH_aO_a) and (E)(E).

Indeed, it is easy to see that OO, EE are the circumcenter and orthocenter of MNP\triangle MNP. From the midsegment, we have
EOa=12HA=MO, \overrightarrow{EO_a} = \frac{1}{2} \cdot \overrightarrow{HA} = \overrightarrow{MO},
so OaO_a is symmetric with EE through NPNP. Then EOaJKEO_aJK is an isosceles trapezoid, which means that J(EOaK)J \in (EO_aK).

On the other hand, since OO is the orthocenter of MNP\triangle MNP, if we denote OO' as the symmetric point of OO through NPNP, then O(E)O' \in (E). In addition, MOMDMO' \perp MD, so DODO' is the diameter of (E)(E). And by the symmetry, we get
DJO=AKO=90, \angle DJO' = \angle AKO = 90^\circ,
which implies that J(E)J \in (E).

From (1) and (2), we get JJ is the intersection of (KHaOa)(KH_aO_a) and (E)(E). Note that J(E)J \in (E) and OJO'J is symmetric to OHOH through NPNP, which implies that JJ is the anti-Steiner point of OHOH with respect to MNP\triangle MNP. Similarly, JJ lies on the Euler circles of BOH\triangle BOH, COH\triangle COH. \square

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