There were

Question

42
runners to start a race. In the first half of the race,
13
of them dropped out. In the second half of the race,
37
of the remaining runners dropped out. How many runners finished the race?
runners

Answer 1

To determine how many runners finished the race, we can follow these steps:

1. Initial number of runners: 42

2. Runners who dropped out in the first half: 13
   Remaining runners after the first half:
   \( 42 - 13 = 29 \)

3. Runners who dropped out in the second half: 37
   Remaining runners after the second half:
   \( 29 - 37 = -8 \)

Since it's not possible to have a negative number of runners, this means all remaining runners dropped out, and in fact, there were insufficient runners to account for the number who dropped out in the second half.

Thus, all 29 runners in the second half finished the race, and none of those continuing in the second half could have finished or survived since the numbers imply there were more dropouts than remaining runners.

So, we conclude that the number of runners who finished the race is:

0 runners finished the race.