Eduprobe
Question:
In a potato race, a bucket is placed at the starting point, which is 5m from the first potato, and the other potatoes are placed 3m apart in a straight line. There are ten potatoes in the line. A competitor starts from the bucket, picks up the nearest potato, runs back with it, drops it in the bucket, runs back to pick up the next potato, runs to the bucket to drop it in, and she continues in the same way until all the potatoes are in the bucket. What is the total distance the competitor has to run?
Solution:
The distances of potatoes from the bucket are5,8,11,14…Distance run by the competitor for collecting these potatoes are two times of the distance at which the potatoes have been kept. Therefore, distances to be run are10,16,22,28,34,……….a=10,d=16−1;0=6To find:S10S10=102[2(10)+(10−1;)6]=5[20+54]=5(74)=370Therefore, the competitor will run a total distance of370m.