Four Whangarei Girls' High School students have been named runners-up in a national problem-solving competition, which saw them figure out some complicated science in just nine hours.
The four bright minds, Grace Elliot, Aria Zhang, Rebeca McKean and Mihi Shepherd, are all Year 13 students and took second place in the NZ's Next Top Engineering Scientist event for senior secondary school students.
The contest took place in August, when the Northland team sat in their school's library for the day to answer the question "What is the fastest humanly possible time for the Olympic 100m freestyle event?"
They concluded that the fastest possible time for the swimming event was 40.7 seconds.
Judges said their "mathematical analysis was very thorough and their report was beautifully written".
The contest is an annual event organised by the University of Auckland's Department of Engineering Science. Each year, participating students are given the question on the morning of the event.