We arrived to a room full of school children clustered in groups. The runners were clustered by the doors. I headed over there because they told the runners to be there by quarter to. 20 minutes later and we were still there.

For those of you who don’t know Cantamaths is a maths competition consisting of 20 questions. These questions are given to you one at a time and you cannot go onto the next question without either answering the question or passing on it. You are only allowed to pass on a problem after getting it incorrect twice and once you have passed you can’t go back and do that problem once you have finished all the other questions. There are runners who must run up to the marker to see whether the question is correct or not.

When they opened the doors into the arena everyone fast walked to the tape which separated us from the tables. I’m sure we would have run had it not been for the woman telling us not to.

The tables were lined up in about 10 rows each containing about 6 tables down. There were gaps between every second table. The compere voiced over our actions, commenting that we all looked very excited.

Once they took the tape away it was a mad rush. Everyone was fast walking to the table that they desired. Our team were aiming to get the table closest to the marker because if it came down to the last second you would be able to get there quickly. I saw a spare seat right next to the marker so I took it. But then I saw the arrows on the ground and it turned out that my seat was the one furthest from the marker. I filled in the sheets with our school name and my teammates' names on it. This was then, under the instruction of the compere, taken to the front. We were then given and envelope with the first question in.

The room was tense as we braced to open it. The compere gave the orders and the room flew into a maths frenzy. The first question was relatively straightforward as they wanted the first people up quickly. Despite the fact we were told to walk, everyone was sprinting up there.

I came back with the next question and my group all grabbed at it, examining the question eagerly. We got stuck on a few and I’d have to constantly run up with incorrect answers just to get a quietly curt no accompanied with a shake of the head. In these times everyone would go off on their own and come up with their own solutions for the problem. This usually happened until we had gotten it incorrect twice and then we would pass the problem.

Once I was sprinting so fast to get up there I went flying as I tried to turn the corner due to the slippery floors.

“And she went flying as she tried to round the corner!” the compere commentated.

But he was the only one who saw because none of my team saw because they were too busy trying to figure out the problem.

“There’s only 20 seconds left in the competition.”

There’s words sent everyone else into running up but we just sat back in our chairs knowing that there was nothing we could do. We gave each other high fives and- “We have a golden ticket in the final seconds!”

A golden ticket is when a team completes all twenty questions.It was - school

In the end we had 80 points so we were one question off getting a place. It was heaps of fun so thank you to everyone who took us there and all the people who organised the competition. Special thanks to Mr Roberts who made all the practices happen and gives us his time every Monday morning for maths club.