MathDB
reversing coins in a row

Source: Serbia MO 2006 2nd Grade P4

April 10, 2021
gamecombinatorics

Problem Statement

There are nn coins aligned in a row. In each step, it is allowed to choose a coin with the tail up (but not one of the outermost markers), remove it and reverse the closest coin to the left and the closest coin to the right of it. Initially, all the coins have tails up. Prove that one can achieve the state with only two coins remaining if and only if nāˆ’1n-1 is not divisible by 33.