2018 AIME II Problem 11

Attempt Problem 11 of the 2018 AIME II below, then check your answer against the professionally curated solution from LIVE by Po-Shen Loh. You can also try the full timed exam, view all 2018 AIME II solutions, or check the answer key.

All problems are used with official legal permission of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA).

11.

Find the number of permutations of 1,2,3,4,5,61, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 such that for each kk with 1k5,1 \le k \le 5, at least one of the first kk terms of the permutation is greater than k.k.

Answer: 461
Concepts:permutationscomplementary countingrecursive counting
Difficulty rating: 3060
Solution:

The condition fails exactly when the first kk terms are a permutation of {1,,k}\{1, \ldots, k\} for some k5.k \le 5. For a permutation of 1,,n,1, \ldots, n, let kk be the smallest length for which the prefix is {1,,k}\{1, \ldots, k\} (the full length nn always works), and let cnc_n be the number of permutations whose smallest such kk is n.n. We want c6.c_6.

Every permutation of 1,,n1, \ldots, n decomposes uniquely as a minimal prefix of length kk (ckc_k choices) followed by any arrangement of the remaining nkn - k values, so k=1nck(nk)!=n!.\sum_{k=1}^{n} c_k \,(n-k)! = n!. Starting from c1=1,c_1 = 1, this gives c2=1,c_2 = 1, c3=3,c_3 = 3, c4=13,c_4 = 13, c5=71,c_5 = 71, and c6=720(1201+241+63+213+171)=720259=461. \begin{aligned} c_6 &= 720 \\ &\quad {}- \tiny(120 \cdot 1 + 24 \cdot 1 + 6 \cdot 3 + 2 \cdot 13 + 1 \cdot 71) \\ &= 720 - 259 = 461. \end{aligned}

← Problem 10#10
Full Exam

Problem 11 in Other Years