AC: I think for me it was kind of the same way most people get into math – there was a math club in my school. My older sister used to also compete in mathematics. So for me, it was sensible to just join the math club as well. And then my teacher at the primary school, she noticed that I was quite good at it. So, she told me about some other clubs outside of school that I could join and she signed me up for competitions.
I didn't initially plan to be really serious about it. But I ended up really enjoying it because solving all of the problems was really interesting and challenging. I liked it and also I thought that all the people that I met through the math club were really cool. So I kept going.
AC: Specifically in competitions, there was always something completely new and that was very fun. Not like school maths where you would just go through a book with different problems and it all got quite similar and repetitive.
In competitive math, you have seen some of these ideas before, but now you have to modify them and apply them in a completely different way. No matter how long I was studying and how many problems I solved, there would always be something different that required a completely new concept and a completely new approach.
AC: My most recent one was this year’s EGMO in Georgia. I think it’s the furthest I've travelled so far. It was fun! I always try to explore and meet some new people. I also got to see some friends I met at previous competitions or camps.
AC: I have mostly focused on competitive math, but I did take part in a math camp where they did a lot of university stuff and some of it was really, really interesting. We did some topology and knot theory which was unusual and nothing like the things I’ve learned before. And also I am quite interested in statistics now, we don't really do any in school in Bosnia. But I am kind of excited to do that, especially because of a course I took on Bayesian inference. Through analysis of product-rating systems, we learned about mathematical ways to systematically update beliefs. That was really fun.
AC: It's an international maths camp and it started in Poland. It's called Maths Beyond Limits and now there is a second edition in the franchise, Maths Beyond Limits Balkans. I was a participant there three times and then from this year on, I'm going to be an organiser. I'm super excited about that because I really enjoyed participating at the camp. I hope I'm going to be able to help other students have the same experience as I did.
AC: Absolutely. Before I attended the camp, I was leaning more towards studying electrical engineering because for me it was like, I like maths. It's very fun. I like the challenge, but that's competitive maths. I don't really know what to do with pure math.
To be honest, I didn’t even know what pure math is. But there was one tutor whose lectures I really, really enjoyed. I would say his lectures were furthest away from competitive maths because he would teach topics like group theory and other university topics that were really far away from what we did at competitions.
The first time I heard about his lectures, I was kind of feeling like maybe it was not for me. But since the topic was really unusual I decided to give it a try. He explained everything in such a cool way and he used so many examples to help us really understand the gist of it. So after that, I was not as intimidated by more university-type lectures. And I started feeling like maybe there was something in this more serious math worth studying at the uni.
AC: Academically, I might say German because when I was in primary school, I found German super difficult. I really didn't like it. English for example is quite easy to learn for most people who live here. I mean, we just watch a lot of TV shows and listen to a lot of music. It just comes naturally because you’re always exposed to it.
For German it was a different story. But then when I was applying to high school, we had an option to do an intensive German course where you would have German multiple times a week. I decided to apply even though I didn't really have good base knowledge. I'm really proud of the German that I know now, although it’s far from perfect.
In competitions, I am really proud of all the medals that I won, especially the two silver medals from EGMO. Those were really cool and I feel very accomplished for winning them. Especially last year when I did most of the problems well. I felt really good about it. During the competition I felt very chill, the problems were just going well, they were gliding.
It’s a special kind of personal accomplishment when you feel like you’re not struggling as much anymore.
About my hobbies, I really enjoy skiing. I've been skiing for a long time. I think I started when I was around five or six. My dad really likes skiing. I have two sisters and he pushed all of us into skiing when we were young. But I never did it professionally. It's just something I like to do in my free time, but I really, really enjoy it.
AC: I think a lot of people that decide to do competitive maths, they start really focusing on the competitive aspect of it and then after a short period of time end up giving up on it because it is very exhausting and very stressful. Even if they pursue it until the end, they kind of feel lost after finishing high school because the competitions were their sole purpose for doing maths and now that there are no more competitions they don't know what to do.
I would say to anybody who wants to get into competitive maths: I know that the competition aspect of it is cool and it feels good to win and have a medal and all of that. It’s a valuable experience and it can be helpful in the future. But if that's the only reason you're doing it, you might as well compete in something else.
I think you should primarily enjoy math as purely math and then do competitions on top of it. Not the other way around. I've seen a lot of people who were just so focused on performing well that it was super stressful for them. You can really burn out doing that.
Another thing I’d mention is not to be scared of learning more complicated concepts. In olympic maths you don’t really need to know a lot of theoretical stuff. It’s all about creativity and you’ll be able to get far knowing just the basics.
But it can be quite helpful to know some higher maths, because some methods of solving problems are based on them. For example, I was shown the tangent line trick for solving inequalities a long time ago. It's basically just derivatives, but we didn’t know any analysis back then. I would always forget how to do it properly.
Even when we were learning derivation a bit later on, which would have been helpful for the trick, I felt like I didn’t really need it, since you’ll never get an analysis problem on a competition. And I really regret thinking that way.
Firstly it actually would’ve been helpful to know stuff like that to better understand some tricks we were learning, because they were not in fact tricks, just methods based on something slightly complicated. And secondly, those topics are something that you will encounter either way, they are an essential part of math. So there is no use in avoiding them.
What I’m trying to say is don’t get intimidated. As long as you know all of the prerequisites, it will be fine. I just wish I had that kind of mindset earlier on, it makes it easier and lets you explore more math.
