You are reading a single comment by @Tenderloin and its replies. Click here to read the full conversation.
  • Latest stupid challenge I have taken on is Julyathon - 31 days of running, need to tick off one 1km, one 2km, etc. I agreed to it before I did the maths and realised that it's 450km over the month. Guess it will keep me busy at least. About 10 of us are doing it, some virtually, if anyone else wants to join in then the more the merrier!

  • What can I say, I didn't go to school for maths!

  • No spreadsheet required...

    Imagine a triangle that's got rows of 1, 2, 3, 4 items:-

    o
    o o
    o o o
    o o o o

    Now imagine another triangle upside down that "fits" on top,

    o x x x x
    o o x x x
    o o o x x
    o o o o x

    This makes a rectangle of 4 x 5

    So to add up 1,2,3,4 you can do 4 * (4+1) / 2 = 4 * 5 / 2 = 10.

    In general that's n * (n+1) /2

    So for 31 you get 31 * 32 / 2 = 496km.

About

Avatar for Tenderloin @Tenderloin started