Jakub Bahyl (source: Courtesy of Comenius University)
THE BRATISLAVA-BASED Comenius University (UK) can boast of a global success: it earned silver in the category of students under 18 at the 22nd World Puzzle Championship, which took place between October 12 and 19 in Beijing.
The competition is comprised of 13 rounds requiring contestants to solve a series of tasks with varying degrees of complexity lasting from 30 to 90 minutes. The tasks, 130 in total, involved math and optimisation, as well as fitting together figures in 3D.
A special category was opened for youths under 18, with Jakub Bahyl, a student of the Faculty of Mathematics, Physics, and Informatics, winning the silver medal, defeated only by Chinese contestant Qiu Yanzhe.
“I was immensely happy because of my final standing, and it means a lot to me,” Bahyl said, as quoted by the UK. “It has proven that with a big effort, really everything can be achieved. I cannot describe how I felt when I realised I would compete with the best people worldwide. I had huge respect, but at the same time, I was driven by curiosity and the need to use my chance,” he explained.
In the category of teams, Slovakia placed fourth out of 30 countries. One of the members of the team, led by coach Blanka Lehotská of the UK’s Department of Landscape Ecology of the Faculty of Natural Sciences, was another student, Matej Uher of the Faculty of Natural Sciences.
