In this example cm.Whatif eachleg in the exampleabovewas cm? Thenwe wouldhave
If eachleg is cm, then the hypotenuseis cm.
Whenthe lengthof eachleg was , the hypotenusewas. Whenthe lengthof eachleg was , the
hypotenusewas. Is this a coincidence?No. Recallthat the legs of all trianglesare
proportional.The hypotenuseof an isoscelesright trianglewill alwaysequalthe productof the lengthof one
leg and. Use this informationto solvethe problemin example2.
Example 2
Whatis the lengthof the hypotenusein the trianglebelow?Sincethe lengthof the hypotenuseis the productof one leg and , you can easilycalculatethis length.One leg is inches,so the hypotenusewill be inches,or about inches.
EquilateralTriangles
Rememberthat an equilateraltrianglehas sidesthat all havethe samelength.Equilateraltrianglesare also
equiangular—allangleshavethe samemeasure.In an equilateraltriangle,all anglesmeasureexactly
.