Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /1194 of 1394

, 2020

Geometry Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Prove it United States

Problem:
Let ABC\triangle ABC be a triangle with AB=7AB = 7, BC=1BC = 1, and CA=43CA = 4\sqrt{3}. The angle trisectors of CC intersect AB\overline{AB} at DD and EE, and lines AC\overline{AC} and BC\overline{BC} intersect the circumcircle of CDE\triangle CDE again at XX and YY, respectively. Find the length of XYXY.

Solution

Solution:
Let OO be the circumcenter of CDE\triangle CDE. Observe that ABCXYC\triangle ABC \sim \triangle XYC. Moreover, ABC\triangle ABC is a right triangle because 12+(43)2=721^{2} + (4\sqrt{3})^{2} = 7^{2}, so the length XYXY is just equal to 2r2r, where rr is the radius of the circumcircle of CDE\triangle CDE. Since DD and EE are on the angle trisectors of angle CC, we see that ODE\triangle ODE, XDO\triangle XDO, and YEO\triangle YEO are equilateral. The length of the altitude from CC to ABAB is 437\frac{4\sqrt{3}}{7}. The distance from CC to XYXY is XYAB437=2r7437\frac{XY}{AB} \cdot \frac{4\sqrt{3}}{7} = \frac{2r}{7} \cdot \frac{4\sqrt{3}}{7}, while the distance between lines XYXY and ABAB is r32\frac{r\sqrt{3}}{2}. Hence we have
437=2r7437+r32 \frac{4\sqrt{3}}{7} = \frac{2r}{7} \cdot \frac{4\sqrt{3}}{7} + \frac{r\sqrt{3}}{2}
Solving for rr gives that r=5665r = \frac{56}{65}, so XY=11265XY = \frac{112}{65}.

Figure 1

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement reproduced verbatim; metadata (topic, difficulty) added by this project.