The results of the 32nd ACM ICPC World Finals are in. My team came in 47th place out of 100 teams, just clinching the African and Middle East title by about 20 minutes! So they won $1,050 and a plaque to be added to the other five we have. While they have slipped a few places since last year, it's got a lot to do with the vigorous training programs improving rapidly.
A total of nine teams got 7 problems, with one solving 8! It's great that the winning team was decided on problems solved rather than time penalty. It was the Russian's that took back the title with St. Petersburg University of IT, Mechanics and Optics the world champions. MIT, Izhevsk and Lviv shared the remaining gold medals coming in that order, but with only 13 minutes separating them all! In the end 22 teams solved 6 or more problems, which I find an amazing achievement.
The final standings are available right here.
The University of Aukland won the South Pacific region and the Universidad de Buenos Aires won the Latin America region. Together with them we were the three southern hemisphere champions -- a great photo opportunity. I'm hoping most people can work out which team is which below.
The final celebrations was exciting, but still doesn't meet the high standards set by Shanghai in 2005. We had a nice dinner followed by two shows. They had two apparently famous jugglers followed by an apparently famous hypnotist. It was interesting to watch, but I don't believe it's something we can't watch back home which is was disappoints me. However, all in all it was a magnificent week and I am very sad to be leaving. It just started snowing down rather strongly (the strongest snowfall I've ever seen!) as we walked out of the celebrations theatre. It's stopped now, but it was a lovely touch to end of this amazing experience.
I'll blog more about the finals and in particular the topics discussed at the coaches meeting when I return to South Africa. I've got a 2 hour bus to catch in about 6.5 hours (and I still have to pack and squeeze in some sleep!), followed by 6 hours of flying to New York. We spend a couple nights there and then we return to Cape Town with 20 hours of flying.
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IOI 2023: Overtaking
11 months ago
Well done the team. Now come back home safely and enjoy the bagging rights :)
ReplyDeleteSorry s/b bragging rights :)
ReplyDeleteWell done Marco and the UCT team! As a UCT CompSci Alum myself this makes me very proud! Marco I also posted the result to muti a couple of days ago but nice to see someone blog about it, these things tend to slip through the cracks.
ReplyDeleteRegards
NN
Yeah it's awesome how well our guys are thriving on the international scene. When you think of some of the universities we beat every year and then think about those who got knocked out long before the finals it's unbelievable.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to get some appreciation and it definitely builds up the confidence for future events.