This website contains problems from math contests. Problems and corresponding tags were obtained from the Art of Problem Solving website.

Tags were heavily modified to better represent problems.

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Found problems: 2

There are $n$ holes in a circle. The holes are numbered $1,2,3$ and so on to $n$. In the beginning, there is a peg in every hole except for hole $1$. A peg can jump in either direction over one adjacent peg to an empty hole immediately on the other side. After a peg moves, the peg it jumped over is removed. The puzzle will be solved if all pegs disappear except for one. For example, if $n=4$ the puzzle can be solved in two jumps: peg $3$ jumps peg $4$ to hole $1$, then peg $2$ jumps the peg in $1$ to hole $4$. (See illustration below, in which black circles indicate pegs and white circles are holes.) [center][img]http://i.imgur.com/4ggOa8m.png[/img][/center] [list=a] [*]Can the puzzle be solved for $n=5$? [*]Can the puzzle be solved for $n=2014$? [/list] In each part (a) and (b) either describe a sequence of moves to solve the puzzle or explain why it is impossible to solve the puzzle.
There are $n$ holes in a circle. The holes are numbered $1,2,3$ and so on to $n$. In the beginning, there is a peg in every hole except for hole $1$. A peg can jump in either direction over one adjacent peg to an empty hole immediately on the other side. After a peg moves, the peg it jumped over is removed. The puzzle will be solved if all pegs disappear except for one. For example, if $n=4$ the puzzle can be solved in two jumps: peg $3$ jumps peg $4$ to hole $1$, then peg $2$ jumps the peg in $1$ to hole $4$. (See illustration below, in which black circles indicate pegs and white circles are holes.) [center][img]http://i.imgur.com/4ggOa8m.png[/img][/center] [list=a] [*]Can the puzzle be solved for $n=5$? [*]Can the puzzle be solved for $n=2014$? [/list] In each part (a) and (b) either describe a sequence of moves to solve the puzzle or explain why it is impossible to solve the puzzle.