2007 AMC 12A Problems/Problem 9
- The following problem is from both the 2007 AMC 12A #9 and 2007 AMC 10A #13, so both problems redirect to this page.
Contents
Problem
Yan is somewhere between his home and the stadium. To get to the stadium he can walk directly to the stadium, or else he can walk home and then ride his bicycle to the stadium. He rides 7 times as fast as he walks, and both choices require the same amount of time. What is the ratio of Yan's distance from his home to his distance from the stadium?
Simple Solution
Let represent the distance from home to the stadium, and let
represent the distance from Yan to home. Our goal is to find
. If Yan walks directly to the stadium, then assuming he walks at a rate of
, it will take him
units of time. Similarly, if he walks back home it will take him
units of time. Because the two times are equal, we can create the following equation:
. We get
, so
, and
. This minus one is the reciprocal of what we want to find:
, so the answer is
Solution 1
Let the distance from Yan's initial position to the stadium be and the distance from Yan's initial position to home be
. We are trying to find
, and we have the following identity given by the problem:
Thus and the answer is
Solution 2
Another way of solving this problem is by setting the distance between Yan's home and the stadium, thus filling in one variable.
Let us set the distance between the two places to be , where
is a random measurement (cause life, why not?). The time going to his home then riding his bike, which is
times faster, to the stadium is equal to the time it takes for him to walk to the stadium. So the equation would be:
Let
the distance from Yan's position to his home.
Let
the distance from Yan's home to the stadium.
But we're still not done with the question. We know that Yan is from his home, and is also
or
from the stadium.
, the
's cancel out, and we are left with
.
Thus, the answer is
~ProGameXD ~minor edits by mobius247
Solution 3
Assume that the distance from home to the stadium is 1, and the distance from Yan to home is . Also assume that the speed of walking is 1, so the speed of biking is 7. Thus
.
We want to find
which is equal to
Solution 4
Let
represent Yan's home,
represent the stadium, and
represent Yan's current position. If Yan walks directly to the stadium, he will reach Point
the same time he will reach
if he is walking home.
Since he bikes
times as fast as he walks and the time is the same, the distance from his home to the stadium must be
times the distance from
to the stadium. If
, then
and
. Since Y is the midpoint of
,
. Therefore, the ratio of Yan's distance from his home to his distance from the stadium is
Video Solution
~savannahsolver
See also
2007 AMC 12A (Problems • Answer Key • Resources) | |
Preceded by Problem 8 |
Followed by Problem 10 |
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 12 Problems and Solutions |
2007 AMC 10A (Problems • Answer Key • Resources) | ||
Preceded by Problem 12 |
Followed by Problem 14 | |
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 |
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