Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 4.9 AIME Find the answer

Let ABCA B C be a triangle with AB=9,BC=10A B=9, B C=10, and CA=17C A=17. Let BB^{\prime} be the reflection of the point BB over the line CAC A. Let GG be the centroid of triangle ABCA B C, and let GG^{\prime} be the centroid of triangle ABCA B^{\prime} C. Determine the length of segment GGG G^{\prime}.

A number or a short expression. Fractions can be typed as 3/2, and spacing doesn't matter.

Solution

Let MM be the midpoint of ACA C. For any triangle, we know that the centroid is located 2/32 / 3 of the way from the vertex, so we have MG/MB=MG/MB=1/3M G / M B=M G^{\prime} / M B^{\prime}=1 / 3, and it follows that MGGMBBM G G^{\prime} \sim M B B^{\prime}. Thus, GG=BB/3G G^{\prime}=B B^{\prime} / 3. However, note that BBB B^{\prime} is twice the altitude to ACA C in triangle ABCA B C. To finish, we calculate the area of ABCA B C in two different ways. By Heron's Formula, we have [ABC]=18(189)(1810)(1817)=36[A B C]=\sqrt{18(18-9)(18-10)(18-17)}=36 and we also have [ABC]=14BBAC=174(BB)[A B C]=\frac{1}{4} B B^{\prime} \cdot A C=\frac{17}{4}(B B^{\prime}) from which it follows that GG=BB/3=48/17G G^{\prime}=B B^{\prime} / 3=48 / 17.

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