Math Riddles!

There is a two-minute time limit for the first three categories, three minutes for the Properties of
Numbers category, and four minutes for the Information category.

One team member may take a shot to (1) Provide an additional minute of time for all teams (2)
Enable the use of a calculator for your team. If EVERY team member takes a shot, your team may
use Google. If at least one team member from TWO different teams takes a shot, the host will
give a hint to all the teams.

Basic Maths

What 3 unique positive numbers give the same result when multiplied and added
together?
There are several books on a bookshelf. If one book is the 4th from the left and 6th from
the right, how many books are on the shelf?
How can you add eight 8's to get the number 1,000 (using only addition)?
In a certain country of 5 = 3. If the same proportion holds, what is the value of 1/3 of
10?
How many degrees (if any) are there in the angle between the hour and minute hands of
a clock when the time is a quarter past three?

Surprising Answers

Mr. Smith has 4 daughters. Each of his daughtershas a brother. How many children does
Mr. Smith have?
What number do you get when you multiply all of the numbers on a telephone's number
pad?
Two boys, Trevor and Tyler, are running a 100 meter race. The first time they race Trevor
beats Tyler by 5 meters. To make things fair, the next time they race Trevor stands 5
meters behind the starting line. Who wins the second race (assuming they run the same
speed as the first race)?
 A hobo picks up cigarette butts from the ground and can make a cigarette with 4 butts. If
he finds 16 cigarette butts, how many cigarettes can he make?
You're going to a friends house and want to give them some brownies. On the way to
their house you cross 5 bridges. At each bridge you must pay a toll of half of your
brownies to the owner. But they are all very nice and give you back a brownie from what
you give them. How many brownies must you start with to give your friend 2 brownies?

Harder Maths

What is 1/2 of 2/3 of 3/4 of 4/5 of 5/6 of 6/7 of 7/8 of 8/9 of 9/10 of 10,000?
What is the sum of all the numbers from 1 to 100?
You are a bug sitting in one corner of a cubic room. You wish to walk (no flying) to the
extreme opposite corner (the one farthest from you). Describe the shortest path that you
can walk.
Two bicyclists start 100 miles apart, and head towards each other, each one going 10
mph. At the same instant, a fly leaves the first bike and flies at 20 mph to the second.
When it gets there, it immediately turns around and heads back to the first. Then it
repeats, going back and forth between the two bikers. By the time they reach each other,
how far will the fly have travelled?
How many times do the hour and minute hands of a clock align each day?

Properties of Numbers (Double!)

What digit is the most frequent between the numbers 1 and 1,000 (inclusive)?
What digit is the least frequent between the numbers 1 and 1,000?
An insurance salesman walk up to a house and knocks on the door. A woman answers,
and he asks her how many children she has and how old they are. She that she has three
girls, and if you multiply the 3 girlsages, you get 36. He says this is not enough
information. So she gives him a second hint. If you add up their ages, the sum is the
number on the house next door. He goes next door and looks at the house number and
 says this is still not enough information. So she says she'll give him one last hint: her
oldest daughter plays piano. What are their ages?
There are 100 light bulbs lined up in a row in a long room.
o Each bulb has its own switch and is currently switched off. The room has an entry
door and an exit door. There are 100 people lined up outside the entry door. Each
bulb is numbered consecutively from 1 to 100. So is each person.
o Person No. 1 enters the room, switches on every bulb, and exits. Person No. 2
enters and flips the switch on every second bulb (turning off bulbs 2, 4, 6...).
Person No. 3 enters and flips the switch on every third bulb (changing the state on
bulbs 3, 6, 9...). This continues until all 100 people have passed through the room.
o What is the final state of bulb No. 64? And how many of the light bulbs are
illuminated after the 100th person has passed through the room?
What is the smallest positive integer that leaves a remainder of 1 when divided by 2,
remainder of 2 when divided by 3, a remainder of 3 when divided by 4, and so on up to a
remainder of 9 when divided by 10?

Information (Triple!)

You have 7 tennis balls that are all identical but one of them is slightly lighter than the
others. Using a balance scale and only two separate weightings, how can you find the
light tennis ball?
Inside of a dark closet are five hats: three blue and two red. Knowing this, three smart
men go into the closet, and each selects a hat in the dark and places it unseen upon his
head.
o Once outside the closet, no man can see his own hat. The first man looks at the
other two, thinks, and says, "I cannot tell what color my hat is." The second man
hears this, looks at the other two, and says, "I cannot tell what color my hat is
either." The third man is blind. The blind man says, "Well, I know what color my
hat is." What color is his hat?
 A windowless room contains four identical light fixtures, each containing an identical light
bulb. Each light is connected to one of four switches outside of the room. Each bulb is
switched off at present. You are outside the room, and the door is closed. You have one,
and only one, opportunity to use the external switches. After this, you can go into the
room and look at the lights, but you may not touch the switches again. How can you tell
which switch goes to which light?
A man wants to have a party in thirty-one days where he will be serving his 1000 barrels
of wine. The only problem is that one of his enemies poisoned one of the barrels. The
poison kills any man who drinks any of the wine in about 30 days, give or take a few
hours. The man has 10 plants that are also killed by the poison in 30 days and can be
used to test the wine. How can identify the single poisoned barrel of wine?
There are 100 coins scattered in a dark room. 90 have heads facing up and 10 are facing
tails up. You cannot tell which coins are which. How do you sort the coins into two piles
that contain the same number of tails up coins?
1. There are N face up cards in Pile 1. We take N cards from Pile 1 to form Pile 2. Lets say, by
chance F of those are face up. This necessarily leaves N-F face up cards in Pile 1. Pile 2
contains N cards, F of which are face up, meaning N-F are face down. When we flip over
Pile 2 these N-F face down card become face up. Both piles contain N-F face up cards.
2. You have 10 stacks of 10 gold coins. All of the coins in one of these stacks are counterfeit,
all the other coins are not. A real coin weighs 10 grammes. A counterfeit coin weighs 11
grammes. You have a modern scale that provides an accurate readout. What is the
minimum number of weighings needed to determine which stack is fake?
How about if you had 11 stacks?
3. You are at a point on the Earth. You travel South 100 miles, East 100 Miles and North 100
Miles. You arrive back where you started. Where are you? You are NOT at the North Pole.
4. Suppose you tie a rope tightly around the Earth's equator. You add an extra 3 feet to the
length. All around the Earth the rope is raised up uniformly as high as is possible to make
it tight again. How high is that?
5. An executioner lines up 100 prisoners single file and puts a red or a blue hat on each
prisoner's head. Every prisoner can see the hats of the people in front of him in the line -
but not his own hat, nor those of anyone behind him. The executioner starts at the end
(back) and asks the last prisoner the colour of his hat. He must answer "red" or "blue." If
he answers correctly, he is allowed to live. If he gives the wrong answer, he is killed
instantly and silently. (While everyone hears the answer, no one knows whether an answer
was right.) On the night before the line-up, the prisoners confer on strategy to help them.
What should they do?
6. Watermelon is 99% water. I have 100 pounds of watermelon. After a week, drying in the
sun, the shrivelled watermelon had only dried down to being 98% water. What is the total
weight of the watermelon now?
7. 100 black and white socks are in a drawer. How many socks must you pull out before you
are guaranteed to have a pair? Generalize to socks of N different colors.
8.