Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /18 of 24

, 2010

Geometry Difficulty 8.7 Shortlist Prove it Balkan Mathematical Olympiad

A triangle ABCABC is given. Let MM be the midpoint of the side ACAC of the triangle and ZZ the image of point BB along the line BMBM. The circle with center MM and radius MBMB intersects the lines BABA and BCBC at the points EE and GG respectively. Let HH be the point of intersection of EGEG with the line ACAC, and KK the point of intersection of HZHZ with the line EBEB. The perpendicular from point KK to the line BHBH, intersects the lines BZBZ and BHBH at the points LL and NN, respectively.
If PP is the second point of intersection of the circumscribed circles of the triangles KZLKZL and BLNBLN, prove that the lines BZBZ, KNKN and HPHP intersect at a common point.

Solution

From the point GG we draw a parallel to the line ACAC, which intersects BZBZ and ABAB at the points VV and SS respectively.
Figure 1
Therefore, since AM=MCAM = MC from the construction hypothesis we have that SV=VGSV = VG, that is VV is the midpoint of the segment SGSG. If TT is the midpoint of the chord EGEG we have ESTVES \parallel TV and therefore BEG=VTG\angle BEG = \angle VTG and since BEG=BZG\angle BEG = \angle BZG we will have VTG=VZG\angle VTG = \angle VZG. Therefore, the quadrilateral VTZGVTZG is cyclic, so TZV=TGV\angle TZV = \angle TGV.

Since GSAHGS \parallel AH, we have TGV=THA\angle TGV = \angle THA. Therefore, we conclude that the quadrilateral MTZHMTZH is cyclic and since MTH=90\angle MTH = 90^\circ it implies that MZH=90\angle MZH = 90^\circ, so BZBZ is the height of the triangle KBHKBH, that is the point LL is the orthocenter of the triangle KBHKBH, since from our hypotheses KNBHKN \perp BH.
In addition, since the quadrilateral LZHNLZHN is cyclic it is known that the second point of intersection PP of the circumscribed circles of the triangles KZL\triangle KZL and BLN\triangle BLN will be located on the KBKB. It suffices now to prove that the points PP, LL and HH are collinear. It is true that from the cyclic quadrilaterals PLNBPLNB, NLZHNLZH and BKZNBKZN follows
KLP=KBN,KLZ=BLN=BHK,ZLH=ZNH=BKH. \angle KLP = \angle KBN, \angle KLZ = \angle BLN = \angle BHK, \angle ZLH = \angle ZNH = \angle BKH.
From the later relations we have KLP+KLZ+ZLH=180\angle KLP + \angle KLZ + \angle ZLH = 180^\circ, so the points PP, LL and HH are collinear, therefore the lines BZBZ, KNKN and HPHP are concurrent. □

Want a route through all this instead of an archive? The track puts 2,000 problems in a working order, from AMC 10 level to the IMO shortlist.

Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement and solution reproduced as published; topic and difficulty added by this site.