AlgebraDifficulty 7.7National olympiad, round 2Prove it
14. Let a1,a2,⋯,an be positive numbers, and for any 1⩽k⩽n, we have a1a2⋯ak⩾1. Prove: 1+a11+(1+a1)(1+a2)2+⋯+(1+a1)(1+a2)⋯(1+an)n<2. ( 1971 year
Solution
14. For any 1⩽k⩽n, since 1+a1⩾2a1,1+a2⩾2a2,⋯,1+ak⩾2ak, noting that a1a2⋯ak⩾1 we get (1+a1)(1+a2)⋯(1+ak)⩾2ka1a2⋯ak⩾2k