IMO 1963 · Problem 5

Prove that \(\cos \frac{\pi}{7}-\cos \frac{2\pi}{7}+\cos \frac{3\pi}{7}=\frac12\).

Official text of the problem. Official problem paper (PDF)

Solution

Put \(x=\pi/7\) and \[ S=\cos x-\cos 2x+\cos 3x. \] Using the identity \[ 2\sin u\cos v=\sin(u+v)+\sin(u-v), \] which follows from the sine addition formulas, we obtain \[ \begin{aligned} 2\sin x\,S &=\sin 2x-(\sin 3x-\sin x)+(\sin 4x-\sin 2x)\\ &=\sin x+\sin 4x-\sin 3x. \end{aligned} \] Since \(7x=\pi\), we have \[ \sin 4x=\sin(\pi-3x)=\sin 3x. \] Thus \(2\sin x\,S=\sin x\). As \(0<x<\pi\), we have \(\sin x>0\), so division gives \(S=\frac12\), as required.

The solution was checked against John Scholes' IMO solution archive (Kalva).