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2004 AMC 12B Problem 1

Problem 1 of 25EasierAlgebra

At each basketball practice last week, Jenny made twice as many free throws as she made at the previous practice. At her fifth practice she made 4848 free throws. How many free throws did she make at the first practice?

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Solution

Each practice she made twice the previous, so going backward we halve. From the fifth practice at 48,48, the earlier practices had 24,24, 12,12, 6,6, and 33 free throws. Thus, the correct answer is A.

More practice

Concepts: geometric sequence · work backwards

Problem text and solution from the LIVE past-contest archive. See also the AoPS wiki page for community solutions.