OMAthalon by Amanda Fraser

OMAthalon

After a two year hiatus due to Covid restrictions, we were thrilled to once again be able to participate in this competition. There were plenty of nerves! For a number of students this was the first year that they had participated in this competition.

The Senior Competition was held on Thursday 18th August at Logan Park High School, with the grand quiz master John Major once again writing the questions for this competition. Students had 8 rounds of questions, which were based around general mathematics knowledge, problem solving, mathematical history, famous mathematicians, along with mixed level curriculum questions and past Junior  OMAthalon style questions. Each team was able to nominate two sections in which they could earn double points.

Logan Park had two teams that rose to the challenge:

Balmac C Team: David Zeng, Naoki Kozakai, Alexander Sun and Charlie Bauchop

Sirius-Altair: Nathan Mutch, Finlay McGilchrist, Ethan Lambeth and Callum Macdiarmid

It was a close competition which saw the Balmac C Team; David, Naoki, Alexander and Charlie, coming in second place.

The Junior Competition was held on Thursday 25th August at the Edgar Centre FM Arena. Each team in the junior competition had a nominated runner who would race each attempt at a question to their marker and then run back to their desk. Results were close in a number of the competitions with only 1 or 2 points deciding the placings.

Year 9:

Logan Park A: Fergus Macdiarmid, Ken Nguyen, Max Bryant and Jay Berry

Logan Park B: Ayako Aoyagi, Charlotte Cane, Lucy Riepl and James Fleming

Logan Park C: Jordan Turner, Odin Hyink, Kenzie Ataullah and Dominic Mein

It was high stakes in the Year 9 competition, with the Logan Park C team being the first of the junior teams to get a question correct. The concentration and frustration on the faces of the competitors was evident throughout the competition. Well done to Jordan, Odin, Kenzie and Dominic who placed 2nd only one point behind the 1st placed team from Kings.

Year 10:

Logan Park A: Campbell Drake, Jenah Allum and Miseki Honjo

Logan Park B: Geordie Stephenson, Shihang Xu, Conor Hobbs and Matai Franzbowden

Logan Park C: Marco Farella, Huia Parker, Lilyan Son and Nell Bosshard

After a nail biting Year 9 competition the Year 10s were raring to go. Logan Park A applied a strategic running strategy with only three members, which enabled them to keep pace with the others. Logan Park C with Marco as a runner were a double threat as he raced around the track to return and get to work on solving the next problem. Matai for the Logan Park B team was running laps around the others and seemed to be heading up to the markers tables twice as often as the other teams. Nearing the end of the competition, the top 6 places were only 1 or 2 points different. A tie-break question had to be answered to sort 1st and 2nd, and 3rd and 4th. The stakes were high with the quickest team to answer the question and get the correct answer back to the marker awarded the top places. A gallant effort by Logan Park A saw them pipped at the post by Otago Girls, seeing them coming in 4th.

Congratulations to all of our competitors.