Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 8.1 Shortlist Prove it Estonia

Let B=(1,0)B = (-1,0) and C=(1,0)C = (1,0) be fixed points on the coordinate plane. A nonempty, bounded subset SS of the plane is said to be nice if
(i) there is a point TST \in S such that for every point QSQ \in S, the segment TQTQ lies entirely in SS; and
(ii) for any triangle P1P2P3P_1P_2P_3, there exists a unique point ASA \in S and a permutation σ\sigma of the indices {1,2,3}\{1,2,3\} for which triangles ABCABC and Pσ(1)Pσ(2)Pσ(3)P_{\sigma(1)}P_{\sigma(2)}P_{\sigma(3)} are similar.
Prove that there exist two distinct nice subsets SS and SS' of the set {(x,y):x0,y0}\{(x,y): x \ge 0, y \ge 0\} such that if ASA \in S and ASA' \in S' are the unique choices of points in (ii), then the product BABABA \cdot BA' is a constant independent of the triangle P1P2P3P_1P_2P_3.

Solution

See IMO 2016 shortlist, problem G3.

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