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Estonian Math Competitions

Estonia geometry

Problem

A triangle with perimeter is divided into triangular pieces for some .

a. Show that there exists a piece with perimeter greater than .

b. Show that if the initial triangle is equilateral, then there exists a piece with perimeter at least .
Solution
a. The sides of the initial triangle are distributed between the pieces. As , the sides of the pieces must also pass through the interior of the initial triangle. So the sum of the perimeters of the pieces is greater than . Hence there must exist a piece with perimeter greater than .

b. Let the area of the equilateral triangle be . Then there must exist a piece with area at least . If were equilateral, it would be similar to the initial triangle with a scale factor of , so its perimeter would be . However, among triangles with a fixed area, an equilateral triangle has the smallest perimeter. Therefore the perimeter of is at least .

Techniques

Optimization in geometryTriangle inequalities