The Mental Calculations World Championship (online) 2024 (hosted by the Mind Sports Olympiad as part of their Grand Prix) has just finished, and we have the winners!
Out of over 90 entrants, 29 people from 7 countries qualified to this semi-final (Saturday 2nd March), and the top 8 were invited to the final (Sunday 14th April).
Daniel Timms (that’s me) wrote the questions for the final and semi-final, and I was in the Zoom calls with the participants. I was impressed as always with the high standard of competition, organization of everyone involved, and respect for the other participants. Congratulations to everyone who qualified, who did very well to qualify to these last two rounds!
Grand Final
The top 8 participants were given 24 questions, simultaneously in a Zoom call. They had between 20–60 seconds to answer each question, with some bonus points for the fastest answers. The competition was open to people of all ages, but in fact only people aged 12–18 qualified to the final. The maximum theoretical score was 300 points.
The time limits and synchronous format make it a very high-pressure competition! See the semi-final video below for a simulation.
🥇 Kaloyan Geshev 🇧🇬 (245 points) is the overall winner. From the last 16 questions, Kaloyan gave the fastest answer to 9 of these, including:
- Finding the prime factors of 10,546,875
- Finding the remainder when 2^115 is divided by 37
Kaloyan—aged 13—is also last year’s gold medallist at last year’s event. He was awarded ‘Most Versatile Calculator’ at the 2022 Mental Calculation World Cup, and won the under-15s age category in the Junior Mental Calculation World Championship 2023 (JMCWC). He is a particular expert in exact cube roots and inexact square roots. He also enjoys cycling and making climatograms.
🥈 Aaryan Shukla 🇮🇳 (222 points), from Maharashtra state, wins the silver medal. He had a similar score to Kaloyan throughout the final. He was the fastest to answer:
- 2862 × 318850
- Write 228051 as a sum of square numbers (for example: 477² + 21² + 10² + 1²)
Aaryan—also aged 13—won the online Mental Calculations World Championship in 2021 by a significant margin. He also collected the overall gold medal in 2022 at the Mental Calculation World Cup in Germany. His favourite category of mental calculation is flash anzan (adding numbers that are presented on a screen in a rapid sequence)—where he recently set a new Guinness World Record. He also enjoys cricket and reading fiction books.
🥉 Abhilakshya Arora 🇮🇳 (131 points) wins the bronze medal. He was the only participant to correctly find the exact square root of 98,765,004,361.
Abhilakshya also came 3rd at MSO online 2021, and won the under-20s age category at the JMCWC in 2022 and 2023. His favourite mental maths categories include cube roots. When he’s not training his brain, he also enjoys playing sports. He trains with Trendz Abacus in Rajasthan, along with Radhika, Aaryan Gupta and Vandan, and several other participants in the semi-final.
Asmita Pal 🇮🇳 (126 points) achieved 4th place. She collected points from questions such as 18 × 22 × 28 × 32.
Asmita is currently studying Computer Science at university in India. She has been winning medals in mental calculation (MSO, MMWC and JMCWC) since 2016. She competed at the first online MSO competition in 2020, where she won the bronze medal.
Radhika Maheshwari 🇮🇳 (118 points) came 5th. She was one of the only contestants to correctly find 7218556 ÷ 3825 (rounded to the nearest integer).
She adds to her history of strong performances at the highest level in mental calculation, including silver in the under-20s age category at JMCWC 2023. As well as mental calculation, Radhika also likes to write and to travel, and she has visited Germany several times to compete in the JMCWC.
Aaryan Gupta 🇮🇳 (108 points) came 6th overall. He was one of the fastest to correctly calculate the square root of 227 to 7 significant figures.
Aaryan won silver at the under-15s age category at JMCWC 2022 in Germany. He also plays sport when he is not training mental maths.
Vandan Nyati 🇮🇳 (75 points). He was last year’s bronze medal-winner, and won silver in the under-15s age category at JMCWC 2023, quickly solving questions such as (862 ÷ 38) + (55 ÷ 7) rounded to the nearest whole number.
As well as mental calculation, he plays cricket and does photography.
Andrej Zivanovic 🇷🇸 would have been the youngest competitor in the final, at 12 years old. However, he couldn’t compete in the Final for personal reasons. Last year, he came 4th in this event, as well as winning the gold medal in the youngest age category of JMCWC 2023.
Semi Final
The semi-final involved 29 participants, and was held on Saturday 2nd March. Several participants were competing in one of their first mental calculation competitions, and have a promising future! See the full ranking:
After the 2021 event, I prepared a sample video so that you can go through the questions as if you were actually competing! Grab a pen and paper, and watch the video, which will explain the steps.
These questions are a sample of the 2021 questions—the 2024 event had more questions (25) but a similar level of difficulty. Good luck!
Further Reading
To find out more about competing in mental calculation, check out the following links:
- Information about all international competitions
- Various resources about learning mental calculation
- Article about preparing for the day of a competition
- Advanced calculations methods (including calendar, multiplication, roots and division)
This event was part of the Mind Sports Olympiad, which also hosts various mind games, such as Scrabble, memory sports, diving chess, and Settlers of Catan.
There are more opportunities to compete in mental calculation in 2024 at other major international events, as well as at the MSO next year! Keep in touch with the organizers of each event for further information. I’ll also publish announcements here, by email and on the Facebook page.