Question

Jamie is attempting to rope off a triangular area for his vegetable garden. He has three stakes and a total of 56 feet of rope to work with. He wants to use all the rope, and he wants the distance in feet between each stake to be an integer. If the distance between two of the stakes is 19 feet, what is the GREATEST possible distance between any two of the stakes?

Answer 1

Total 56 feet, used 19 feet; 37 feet left. HOWEVER, you need to split that up so D won't do.

In a triangle, each side can be AT MOST the sum of the other two sides (or half the total circumference); 56 : 2 = 28 therefore. So not answer C. However, that gives you a triangle with an area of ZERO (disregarding the thickness of the rope and stakes) so B is less than useful. The correct answer, in a way, though.

It really depends on how you look at this problem, but three points in a line do not, to me, a triangle make. So I'd have to answer A