Ballpark
Puzzle #2 · 21 September 2026
The five questions from that day's Ballpark, each with its answer, the fact behind it and a link to the source. Rather play it first? It is in the archive.
1. What is the circumference of the Large Hadron Collider's ring?
26,659 meters
26,659 m, nearly 27 km. Its 1,232 main dipole magnets run at 1.9 K, colder than outer space. Source
Image: Ryan Bodenstein · CC BY 2.0, cropped
2. About how many parts make up a Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet?
6M parts
About 6 million, made by more than 550 suppliers in almost 30 countries. Source
Image: Juke Schweizer · CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped
3. In how many different ways can six 2x4 LEGO bricks be combined?
915M combinations
915,103,765. The stud-and-tube design that makes it possible was patented on 28 January 1958. Source
Image: Kenny Louie · CC BY 2.0, cropped
4. How many protein-coding genes are in the human genome?
20,000 genes
About 20,000. Surprisingly, they make up less than 2 percent of the whole genome. Source
Image: Scotted400 · CC BY 3.0, cropped
