2011 AMC 10A Problems/Problem 4

Revision as of 17:59, 10 March 2015 by Mathgeek2006 (talk | contribs)

Let X and Y be the following sums of arithmetic sequences:

\begin{eqnarray*}X &=& 10+12+14+\cdots+100,\\ Y &=& 12+14+16+\cdots+102.\end{eqnarray*}

What is the value of Y - X?

$\textbf{(A)}\ 92\qquad\textbf{(B)}\ 98\qquad\textbf{(C)}\ 100\qquad\textbf{(D)}\ 102\qquad\textbf{(E)}\ 112$

Solution 1

We see that both sequences have equal numbers of terms, so reformat the sequence to look like:

\begin{align*} Y = \ &12 + 14 + \cdots + 100 + 102\\ X = 10 \ + \ &12 +  14 + \cdots + 100\\ \end{align*} From here it is obvious that Y - X = 102 - 10 = $\boxed{92 \ \mathbf{(A)}}$.

Solution 2

We see that every number in Y's sequence is two more than every corresponding number in X's sequence. Since there are 46 numbers in each sequence, the difference must be: $46*2=\boxed{92}$

See Also

2011 AMC 10A (ProblemsAnswer KeyResources)
Preceded by
Problem 3
Followed by
Problem 5
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
All AMC 10 Problems and Solutions

The problems on this page are copyrighted by the Mathematical Association of America's American Mathematics Competitions. AMC logo.png