Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 4.3 AIME Find the answer Italy

Problem:

Let ABCABC be an acute triangle and let DD be the foot of the bisector from AA. Let ω\omega be the circle through AA tangent to BCBC at DD, and let E,FE, F be the intersections of ω\omega with AB,ACAB, AC respectively. The tangents to ω\omega at EE and FF meet at PP. Knowing that PE=3PE=3 and that the radius of ω\omega is 44, what is the length of the segment PDPD?

Pick one

Solution

Solution:

The answer is (B). Let OO be the center of ω\omega; by hypothesis we have EAD^=FAD^\widehat{EAD}=\widehat{FAD}, so DD is the midpoint of arc EFEF and in particular ODOD passes through the midpoint of segment EFEF. It follows that ODOD is the perpendicular bisector of EFEF, since it is perpendicular to it and passes through its midpoint. Now, since PEPE and PFPF are tangents, we have PE=PFPE=PF and hence PP also belongs to the perpendicular bisector of EFEF. This implies that P,D,OP, D, O are collinear. The triangle PEOPEO is right-angled at EE by construction, so we have PO2=(PD+DO)2=(PD+4)2=EO2+PE2=42+32PO^2=(PD+DO)^2=(PD+4)^2=EO^2+PE^2=4^2+3^2, from which we obtain PD=1PD=1.

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement translated into English from it; metadata (topic, difficulty) added by this project.