Medaling in Maths

As our four team members; me, Jamie Green, Sasha Hajnal-Corob and Baichuan Li sat down at our table, we all began to do the practice problems presented to us along with the 36 other teams in our regional final of the UKMT Senior Team Maths Challenge.

The first round started and after 26 minutes (out of 45 minutes) we had finished every question that had been set for us. Our excitement was severely outweighed by the fervour of checking each other’s answers. With Westminster School, renowned for being the reigning champions for the last two years, sitting behind us the competition was intense. Having finished the round, we held our breath. We had finished the first round with 60/60. Looking over at Westminster, Baichuan discovered that they also scored top marks. It looked like the competition was going to be tough.

The second round consisted of the crossnumber. Picture a crossword but with numbers. About 5 minutes in one of our team members made a fatal mistake which cost us a mark. Hindered, we persevered. This time we finished 25 minutes before the end of the round with a score of 79/80 and we were ecstatic. Having once again learned of Westminster’s score we discovered that the same mistake had been made by them! This left us level top with about 5 schools in the hall.

The last round would decide it all. There were 60 marks up for grabs and we needed a substantial portion of them. The round consisted of four tasks per question. Our team was split into two pairs with the first and third tasks done by pair one and the second and fourth tasks done by pair two. In this way it was a kind of relay race. A pair can’t make a single mistake otherwise the repercussions continue to the final answer. We successfully did the first two questions without any mistakes. I don’t know if we were lulled into a false sense of security or if the questions were actually harder but we were unable to finish question 3. We helplessly watched as we crunched numbers to no avail. We had lost 6 marks; furthermore, we thought we had lost. Westminster hadn’t made a single mistake in this last round and we were 6 points behind them. We finished the last question and looked over to Westminster’s table. They were stuck. With only three minutes to go they were fiercely rearranging algebra. At this point we had no idea what the outcome would be. The positions were announced; Westminster were 3rd, 2nd place went to Woodhouse College and Highgate were top.

With the organiser announcing that she had forgotten the medals at home we were treated to certificates and handshakes from the members of staff. The whole hour after that was a blur for us all. With us in the National finals, an overexcited Mr Abramson on the phone and Baichuan texting his maths friends, the weeks of intense training had paid off. Oscar Darwin (11EG)

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