The Library of Competitions
Tian2 Editions
A brand-new (inaugural 2026) team-based physics tournament hosted by UC Berkeley's Society of Physics Students. Three timed rounds — Lab, Team Free-Response, GUTS — with 25 teams in the first year. The full 2026 archive is publicly available and all five PDFs are verified. Student and Instructor editions published.
The Berkeley Physics Tournament is UC Berkeley's inaugural-2026 team-based physics contest, run by the Society of Physics Students in the Physics North building on campus. In its first year, 25 teams competed across three timed rounds. Because the tournament is brand new, the field is small and the archive is exactly one year deep — but that one year is fully public, fully archived, and a strong basis for preparation.
A competition day runs three back-to-back team rounds with different characters. The Lab round asks teams to design an experimental procedure and collect real data under time pressure. The Team FRQ round presents nine multi-part written problems pitched beyond standard high-school physics, designed for teams to split. The GUTS round is a fast relay where strategy matters as much as physics knowledge. All three rounds are team-only — there is no individual component.
All five publicly available BPT PDFs are SHA-256 verified: Team FRQ problems (6 pp), GUTS problems (9 pp), Lab + rubric (3 pp), Team FRQ problems-and-solutions (16 pp), GUTS problems-and-solutions (12 pp). The Lab solutions gap is real — the organizers do not publish them. The problems and solutions are read-at-source only; Tian2 does not reproduce official content. Read them free at berkeley-pt.org/archive/ ↗.
| Round | Working time | Weight | What it tests |
|---|---|---|---|
| Team Lab | 60 minutes | 20% | Hands-on measurement with supplied materials. Graded on procedure, data quality, discussion, and error analysis. Lab solutions not published — rubric is public. |
| Team FRQ | 75 minutes | 40% | Nine multi-part long-form problems spanning topics beyond standard high-school physics. Partial credit for justified intermediate steps. Problems and solutions both published. |
| GUTS | 75 minutes | 40% | Eight sets of three problems submitted in batches; the final set is estimation-based. Strategy-heavy — skip-and-return is essential. Problems and solutions both published. |
The inaugural field was 25 teams. For a school team looking to compete in a tournament-style physics contest without competing against decades of HMMT veterans, BPT in its early years is a particularly accessible entry point. As with any new competition, format changes between cycles are possible — verify rules and format against the official site before committing.
Lab: Reasoning over perfect data. The rubric rewards uncertainty analysis and a clear written procedure more than a clean numerical answer. FRQ: State assumptions before computing; partial credit is awarded for justified intermediate steps even when the final answer is wrong. GUTS: Triage on first read — identify 1-minute checks, 5-minute setups, and deep wells; submit the short ones immediately and skip the deep wells unless time permits.
A brand-new tournament. The field is small; the problems are good.— Editor's note
| Resource | What it is |
|---|---|
| berkeley-pt.org ↗ | Official site — dates, registration, rules, syllabus PDF |
| BPT 2026 Archive ↗ | All five public PDFs — problems and solutions for FRQ and GUTS; Lab + rubric |
| Syllabus & reference sheet ↗ | Official topic scope, team-size rules, scoring formula, approved formula sheet |
| 2026 Results ↗ | Final rankings and medal breakdown from the inaugural year |
| Tian2 Student Edition (PDF) ↓ | Independent prep guide — round breakdowns, 6-week plan, strategy notes, worked examples |
| Tian2 Instructor Edition (PDF) ↓ | School-side guide — team management, registration, coaching notes |
