The great IMO mountain race

Guest blog post by Charles and Wen!

“In the great Budapest mountains, before the dawn of the twenty second century, there were at least six great adventurers who climbed a medium-sized hill in Budapest…” — Wen

The British team arrived late on Sunday evening, and Wen arrived even later (actually he arrived on Monday afternoon with our deputy leader Andrew). We’re training with them during our stay in Budapest.

With the British team arriving in such a tired state, we had a natural advantage in the first training exam F1. Happily, we had a higher overall score on question 1 (thanks to a small slip by UNK 1). Wen completed F1 separate from the rest of us while transiting at Perth airport attaining the highest mark to time ratio.

In the afternoon, both the Australian and UK teams travelled to some “mountains”. Wen and Ethan paved the way for the rest of the crew, helping them find idyllic rest spots, definitely safe shortcuts and impromptu photo opportunities.

At the top of the mountain, our team leader Angelo practised walking with confidence and purpose (essential for persuading the coordinators at the IMO):

After the mountain trip, the team visited Buda castle. After a near death experience racing up a flight of stairs, we had a chance to catch our breath continue our trip to the top of the castle in an elevator.

We were treated to more views of surrounding Budapest, and visited the castle’s water installation.

We got to know the UK team a bit over dinner in the city, and then caught the metro back to our hotel for an early sleep. Tomorrow, we’ll again be doing another trial exam, only this time Wen will be with us.