Research Entry: Personal Interview: Forest Tong

Yesterday, I interviewed Forest Tong, who was a USAMO honorable mention (meaning that at one point, he was top 20 in the country in competitive math). He is also the founder of the Ithaca Math Circle, an organization of which I was formerly a part. I asked him the same questions as I asked Ofer, hoping to get a different perspective. Forest is currently a student at MIT.

I: What contests did you participate in?
F: Let's see: AMC, AIME, USA(J)MO, ARML, NY(S)ML, Purple Comet, PUMaC, HMMT, MAML, OMO, Mandelbrot, that should be it...

I: What were your primary training resources for each one?
F: For specific contest training, I would just do past tests and look over the solutions. For getting better at problem-solving in general, I read through and did almost all the problems in Paul Zeitz's Art and Craft of Problem-Solving, which by the way is one of the best books ever written. I also used the AoPS series and classes (WOOT and Olympiad Geometry), and occasionally random handouts on the internet like Yufei Zhao's.

I: How much did you practice for each competition?
F:. I did a lot of AMC, AIME, and USAMO practice tests -- my best estimate would be around 20 AMC's, 10 AIME's, and 10 USAMO's, not including WOOT practice. But the majority of my practice time was spent doing problems in Zeitz. I aimed to spend about an hour a day on problem-solving, even in little chunks of time like while on the bus in the morning.

I: Do you have any general advice for me?
F: Paul Zeitz. No seriously, the first couple of chapters of his book are the best problem-solving advice I've ever encountered.


I: In particular, what are the differences between succeeding in the
Putnam exam vs more "traditional" Olympiads such as the USAMO, IMO,etc?
I: What other options do I have for math competitions in college other than
Putnam and International Math Contest?

F:Putnam is a lot about speed -- you only get half an hour for each problem, I think. The problems often involve only one trick, and can sometimes be pretty contrived. I generally like USAMO problems better, though I have no idea what the writers have been doing in recent years.

F: What's the International Math Contest? I haven't heard of people doing any competitions in college other than Putnam. At MIT, problem-solvers tend to turn to things like the Mystery Hunt.