Off to Shen Zhen, China

back left to right: Si Ying, Belinda, Dorette, Aidi, Lim Min
front left to right: Pin Lin, Surya, Mrs Ng (RGS teacher), Lydia, Mr Wang (NUSH teacher)

Lim Min left for Shen Zhen this morning. She is part of the Singapore Team participating in the China Girls Math Olympiad. She will be back on Wednesday night.

金牌数目历来最多 数学奥林匹克新加坡全球排第三

This is posted by LJ's mum.

金牌数目历来最多 数学奥林匹克新加坡全球排第三

陈紫筠(2011-07-27)

新加坡在第52届国际数学奥林匹克比赛中取得突破，首次挤入三甲，仅排在中国和美国之后。 　　我国队伍在这项比赛中多年一直徘徊于20至29名内，去年获得第22名，而表现最好的一次是2005年，排世界第14。 　　这次除了在排行榜上取得大跃进外，获得的金牌数目也是历来最多的。自90年代初取得第一面金牌后，我国队伍十几年来与金牌无缘，今年六名参赛的学生共夺下四面金牌，一面银牌和一面铜牌。其中有三名学生在个人排行榜上名列第二、四以及六名。 　　这支为国争光的队伍由英华中学、莱佛士书院（高中部）以及新加坡国立大学数理中学的六名学生组成，他们年龄介于16至18岁。　　我国从1988年就派队参赛，新加坡数理协会副主席王金富博士说，每年派出的队伍平均获得五面奖牌，而今年的成绩是最令人振奋的。 　　他受访时说，表现好的原因是小学数学课程奠定的稳固基础，以及给予有特别才能学生的额外培训，要取得更多突破是指日可待的。 　　金牌得主是英华中学的洪捷君、国大数理中学的林捷以及莱佛士书院（高中部）的丁岳和关俊杰。国大数理中学的洪延昇和莱佛士书院（高中部）的许崇乐，则分别获得银以及铜牌。他们除了丁岳是新加坡永久居民外，都是土生土长的新加坡人。 为国争光的队伍首次在国际数学奥林匹克比赛中，挤入前十名，排名全世界第三名。代表我国参赛的有六名学生，图中的林捷（左）以及洪延昇分别获得金牌以及银牌。（谢光凭摄） 　　在个人表现中取得亮眼成绩的三名参赛者是林捷、关俊杰和洪捷君，分别排在第二、四以及六名次。 　　世界亚军林捷（16岁）对自己的成绩感到意外，他说：“一些题目比筹备时接触过的困难许多，我花了不少时间解答，几乎是在最后几分钟才完成。有如此表现，我感到十分高兴。此外，这也是一次很好的经验，让我有机会与来自德国、中国等国家的优秀选手切磋。” 　　林捷为比赛下了一番苦功，除了接受规定训练外，也在家里自习。他毕业自女皇镇小学，有多次参加各项数学比赛的经验，这也是他第三次参加奥数。 　　率领队伍出征的国大数学系副教授黄恩来说，林捷解答问题的技巧纯熟，思路清晰有条理，他只差两分就满分。 　　由教育部、新加坡国立大学以及新加坡数理协会成立的筹备小组，一年前就紧锣密鼓为比赛作足准备。先是通过全国性奥林匹克比赛挑选出20名学生接受每周一次的训练，再从中挑选出六名学生代表国家出赛。 　　洪延昇（17岁）说，比赛前的筹备功夫不简单，他们两个月里每星期六天、每天八小时的训练，除此之外，还得参加两周的“闭门”密集训练营。 　　这项一年一度的国际比赛，于本月16日至24日在荷兰首都阿姆斯特丹举行，共有101个国家的564名代表参加，他们都在20岁以下。这次比赛中，共颁发了50面金牌、100面银牌以及150面铜牌。

《联合早报》 编辑：杨丽娟

S'pore ends gold drought at Maths Olympiad

IMO 2011 Question 6

This is posted by LJ's mum.

Lim Jeck has returned home safely this morning - this certainly beats all the accolades that he has won in the IMO :) After an exhausting 12.5-hr flight, he is now sleeping soundly. After all these euphoria at the IMO, the next few weeks he will have rough sledding playing catch-up with all the missed school lessons. :(

I think it is going to be a challenging task for Singapore to maintain her top positions (country rank 3rd and individual ranks 2nd, 4th and 6th) next year. Out of the 5 team members who should qualify for next year's IMO again, 2 are likely to move to other Science Olympiads. This year's questions are favourable to the team, next year's questions might not be.

Anyway, back to my main topic, the Question 6 which stumped many contestants except for the 6 (Lim Jeck being one of them) out of a total of 564 contestants, who could solve it completely.

The IMO 2011 questions.



Lim Jeck's solution for Question 6.

IMO 2011 Results Out!

This is posted by LJ's mum.

Wow ... This is Singapore's best showing in 24 years (after participating in IMO since 1988). Singapore is ranked 3rd, just after China and USA, and we have won 4 Gold 1 Silver and 1 Bronze medals. :O

Full Details of Country Ranking
Not only that, our contestants are ranked among the best in the world! Lim Jeck is ranked Individual 2nd, Joseph joint-Individual 4th and Jie Jun joint-Individual 6th.

Full Details of Individual Ranking
Speechless :D If the same team (minus Jie Jun who is in JC2 this year) goes again next year, do you think we can beat China to be the top ranking country in IMO 2012 (Argentina)? :P

Afterparty:
You can see the Singapore team, about 19-22 seconds into the video:

IMO 2011 Excursion The Hague / Games

Wow .. you can see the Singapore Team in this video. 13-15 secs into the video, you can see Lim Jeck, Joseph, Yan Sheng, Ryan and Jie Jun.

IMO 2011 - Coordination Day 1

This is posted by LJ's mum.

3 questions each day are scheduled to be coordinated. However, Team Singapore's coordination was done so efficiently that they managed to complete 5 questions (P1, P2, P3, P4, P6) in Day 1 of coordination. Left with P5 (or Question 5).

Update: All partial scores are removed ... full results to be released soon, likely tomorrow late night. Sorry to keep you all in suspense :P

Déjà vu

This is posted by LJ's mum.

IMO 2011 Team Singapore (photo taken last night at Changi Airport Terminal 3)

IMO 2010 Team Singapore (photo taken at Terminal 3, almost the same location). Notice Lim Jeck was shorter than Ang Yan Sheng then.

IMO 2009 Team Singapore (photo taken at same terminal, same location?). Notice how short Lim Jeck was then.

Can you find who else has appeared in all 3 photos, besides Lim Jeck?

Off to Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Tonight at 2355 hrs we will be flying on Singapore Airlines SQ324 to Amsterdam for the 52nd International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO). A/Prof Wong and A/Prof Tay had flown there earlier for the jury meeting.

The programme is as follows:
13 July - Arrival Day for Team Leader & Observer A
14 to 16 July - Jury Meeting
16 July - Arrival Day for Deputy Leaders, Contestants and Observers B
17 July - Opening Ceremony
18 to 19 July - Competition Day 1 and 2
20 to 22 July - Coordinatin/Final Jury Meeting/Excursion
23 July - Closing Ceremony
24 July - Departure Day
25 July - Reach Singapore (0545 hr)

During the IMO, we will be staying at Novotel Amsterdam City. The temperature is about 12 to 22 degree celsius.

A total of 574 participants from 102 countries (check here) are taking part in the 52nd IMO.

Official results of the IMO should be out by 23 July. Past and present IMO results can be checked here.

2011 River Valley Maths Challenge

This is posted by Lim Li.

This morning, my teacher brought us (Wei Wei, Ji Xuan, Jia Ning, Stephen, Wei Jue and I) to the River Valley Maths Challenge (RVMC). 363 students from 62 schools took part in the RVMC. The participants were given free water and ruler. The individual round was easy, many people commented that they could do all the questions but I made a number of careless mistakes. The competition was held in the RVHS auditorium. We had to write our answers on the a separate sheet, there was no shading on OAS form. The team round was harder than the individual round, my team could not do one question and did not multiply correctly the last question, which was 59x59x59.

The food was nice, but I was just a tad disappointed that it was not buffet kind as each one of us had paid $5. There was mango pudding and packet lunch. I thought that the sauce was ketchup and was wondering why it was so spicy, until Step told me it was chilli.

At the prize presentation, there was an audience Math quiz where vouchers could be won by anyone who gave the correct answers. It was based on luck and quick calculation and we were not supposed to use calculator but I think I was not the only one who cheated as someone could compute 1000000000/50/60/24/365. They must call you before you could answer so an element of luck was involved here.

There were 10 individual prizes, 3 team prizes and 10 individual + team prizes. I won the 10th individual prize, which was a trophy. Sadly, my school did not get any team prize and my teacher was utterly disappointed as he could not brag now :P

NMOS 2011 Round 1 Answers

This is posted by Lim Li
(Note: I did not take part in this competition as I am P6!)

NMOS 2011 R1 Answers
1. 220
2. 8
3. 30
4. 1006
5. 8
6. 4
7. 46
8. 46
9. 1003
10. 67
11. 210
12. 490
13. 30
14. 52 (answer given by someone from the c-box)
15. 20
16. 84
17. 125
18. 5
19. 80
20. 60
21. 21
22. 233
23. 2008
24. 19
25. 7
26. 3
27. 50
28. 15
29. 81
30. 72

Guys or Gals: Who's better at Maths Olympiad?

This is posted by LJ's mum.

Generally speaking, guys perform much better than gals in Maths Olympiad. Some evidences are below:
- Annual International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) total participation: typically, 90% male and 10% female
- Top 10 winners of Singapore Mathematical Olympiad (SMO) - SMO Junior 2010 (9 boys, 1 girl), SMO Senior 2010 (9 boys, 1 girl), SMO Open 2010 (10 boys)
- Singapore's participation in IMO from 2006-2011: all-boys team
- Out of about 24 members in the 2010/2011 National Team, there is only 1 girl
- No girl has ever topped the SMO Junior/Senior/Open
- No girl has ever topped the following primary-level Math Olympiad competitions: NMOS/SMOPS/APMOPS/RIPWMC

Nevertheless, as in most things in life, there are exceptions. Lisa Sauermann from Germany has been one of the top winners in the IMO. To-date, she has garnered 3 Gold and 1 Silver IMO medals. She was ranked individual 4th in 2010 and 3rd in 2009.

Best of all, Lisa (age 18 this year) is taking part in IMO 2011, and she looks set to take over the throne from Christian Reiher, as the Champion in the IMO Hall of Fame. Those ranked above her in the current Hall of Fame are all past (or long past) 19 years old and are not eligible to take part in the IMO anymore.

I wonder if Lisa is taking part again next year ....

To all girls out there who aspire to shine in the Mathematical Olympiad arena: if Lisa can do it, you can do it too!