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Computer whiz kids from Zhejiang U take top prize
June 14, 2011, Tuesday
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A team of computer geniuses from Zhejiang University takes first place in the world's most prestigious collegiate programming contest. Winners are called "the smartest people in the world," reports Shi Xiaohan.
The computer science team from Zhejiang University in Hangzhou won first prize in the prestigious 35th ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest.
The prize certificate, awarded June 3 in Orlando, Florida, in the United States, calls the three-person team "the smartest people in the world" for taking top honors in the grueling, five-hour contest. The team includes Mo Luyi, Wu Zejun and Ouyang Jialin, and praise goes to coach Wang Can.
Second prize went to the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, the US, third prize to Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, and fourth prize to Saint Petersburg State University in Russia.
ACM is the Association for Computing Machinery, an international association; ICPC is the International Collegiate Programming Contest.
Originating in the United States in 1970s, ACM-ICPC is an innovative initiative to raise the aspirations, performance and opportunity of top students in computer science. The five-hour contest fosters creativity, teamwork and innovation in building new software programs, and enables students to test their ability to perform under pressure.
The finals pitted 10 regional winners, all three-person teams from around the world.
During the past year, the Zhejiang team went through 62 five-hour training competitions to get ready for the international final event. Including research and discussion, each training was around 10 hours long.
"We need to stay versatile on math, programming and innovation," says Ouyang. "Especially when the group training is not very fruitful, we need individual training to make a breakthrough."
"In the world final, each team on the top 10 has a chance to get first prize," says coach Wang. "Luck played a big part in our getting first place."
The team was extremely lucky in the finals since right from the very beginning it rose to the top and remained in the top three for most of the time.
"It was torture for me," says coach Wang. "Each time they solved a problem, the ranking changes a little bit. After they got onto the top for the fourth time, I just got out of the competition room for half an hour to calm myself down."
The five-hour competition was exhausting. "We needed to take turns to have rests. Otherwise, we would break down in the end," says Wu Zejun, a first-year graduate student in computer science. His team mates are both in math, Mo, a senior, and Oyang, a first-year graduate student.
After years of training and competitions, the team has developed a strong yet flexible mentality to deal with tension. In regional competitions, there were ups and downs. In the first regional contest in Fuzhou, China's Fujian Province, the team only placed third among the five teams from Zhejiang University. "We got stuck right from the beginning," says Wu, "and the type of question was not with us." But after the setback, the team bounced back to get first place in their second regional competition in Vietnam.
"We have experienced too many unlucky moments and failures to feel afraid of them," says Mo. In a regional final in 2009, Ouyang got the answer wrong and tried to correct it in the last minute - just one line of programming was left uncorrected. "If we had gotten it right, we could have made it to the world final," says Mo.
"There's a lot of pressure, as back then I was not only making my own mistake but also wasting my teammates' time," Ouyang says, "especially on-site when other teams are competing fiercely against us."
"Ouyang used to get easily overstressed, but since we became teammates in 2008 I have seen how he gradually has managed to control his nervousness," says Mo. "We have all grown up so much during the process."
The contestants all undergo a strict selection process according to the coach Wang. The first round of selection comes in June every year when around 30 students are selected from among hundreds of contestants. Then the 30 students are divided into four groups and compete against each other for a month.
Then, 15 students are selected to attend regional contest of ICPC. They form five teams of three or four persons each and begin intensive training in August. Regional competitions start in October when Chinese universities compete against their counterparts in Asia to gain places in the world finals. Around 8,000 teams worldwide compete in regional contests.
The computer science team from Zhejiang University in Hangzhou won first prize in the prestigious 35th ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest.
The prize certificate, awarded June 3 in Orlando, Florida, in the United States, calls the three-person team "the smartest people in the world" for taking top honors in the grueling, five-hour contest. The team includes Mo Luyi, Wu Zejun and Ouyang Jialin, and praise goes to coach Wang Can.
Second prize went to the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, the US, third prize to Tsinghua University in Beijing, China, and fourth prize to Saint Petersburg State University in Russia.
ACM is the Association for Computing Machinery, an international association; ICPC is the International Collegiate Programming Contest.
Originating in the United States in 1970s, ACM-ICPC is an innovative initiative to raise the aspirations, performance and opportunity of top students in computer science. The five-hour contest fosters creativity, teamwork and innovation in building new software programs, and enables students to test their ability to perform under pressure.
The finals pitted 10 regional winners, all three-person teams from around the world.
During the past year, the Zhejiang team went through 62 five-hour training competitions to get ready for the international final event. Including research and discussion, each training was around 10 hours long.
"We need to stay versatile on math, programming and innovation," says Ouyang. "Especially when the group training is not very fruitful, we need individual training to make a breakthrough."
"In the world final, each team on the top 10 has a chance to get first prize," says coach Wang. "Luck played a big part in our getting first place."
The team was extremely lucky in the finals since right from the very beginning it rose to the top and remained in the top three for most of the time.
"It was torture for me," says coach Wang. "Each time they solved a problem, the ranking changes a little bit. After they got onto the top for the fourth time, I just got out of the competition room for half an hour to calm myself down."
The five-hour competition was exhausting. "We needed to take turns to have rests. Otherwise, we would break down in the end," says Wu Zejun, a first-year graduate student in computer science. His team mates are both in math, Mo, a senior, and Oyang, a first-year graduate student.
After years of training and competitions, the team has developed a strong yet flexible mentality to deal with tension. In regional competitions, there were ups and downs. In the first regional contest in Fuzhou, China's Fujian Province, the team only placed third among the five teams from Zhejiang University. "We got stuck right from the beginning," says Wu, "and the type of question was not with us." But after the setback, the team bounced back to get first place in their second regional competition in Vietnam.
"We have experienced too many unlucky moments and failures to feel afraid of them," says Mo. In a regional final in 2009, Ouyang got the answer wrong and tried to correct it in the last minute - just one line of programming was left uncorrected. "If we had gotten it right, we could have made it to the world final," says Mo.
"There's a lot of pressure, as back then I was not only making my own mistake but also wasting my teammates' time," Ouyang says, "especially on-site when other teams are competing fiercely against us."
"Ouyang used to get easily overstressed, but since we became teammates in 2008 I have seen how he gradually has managed to control his nervousness," says Mo. "We have all grown up so much during the process."
The contestants all undergo a strict selection process according to the coach Wang. The first round of selection comes in June every year when around 30 students are selected from among hundreds of contestants. Then the 30 students are divided into four groups and compete against each other for a month.
Then, 15 students are selected to attend regional contest of ICPC. They form five teams of three or four persons each and begin intensive training in August. Regional competitions start in October when Chinese universities compete against their counterparts in Asia to gain places in the world finals. Around 8,000 teams worldwide compete in regional contests.
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