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How to win a lottery

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Wow thats just what I have been looking for ;-)

Myself and a couple of geeks have regular competitions between ourselves to see if we can invent a mathematical way of making money from the lottery or any other form of gambling. (Its all for fun and is about the geeky maths of probability rather than trying to make money). Between us we have investigated every theory going and not one of them comes even close to working.
 
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I did develop my own very simple roulette betting strategy, but after few successful visits to casino, they drained me. It can make around 150-250 in 5-8 hrs with starting bank around £300. Works only in casinos where they have roulette betting touchscreen machines with camera over the real roulette table, so number history can be seen. Otherwise if you stand by the table with pen and paper - you`ll be kicked out quickly :D But I have even better way of winning - I have computer software where I need to input number. So ideally I would need somebody at home by PC and me on the phone telling what number to input into software. But again, any casino will escort you out if you spend hours on the phone.

Need some advice how to work it out :D
 
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RBS said:
I did develop my own very simple roulette betting strategy, but after few successful visits to casino, they drained me. It can make around 150-250 in 5-8 hrs with starting bank around £300. Works only in casinos where they have roulette betting touchscreen machines with camera over the real roulette table, so number history can be seen. Otherwise if you stand by the table with pen and paper - you`ll be kicked out quickly :D But I have even better way of winning - I have computer software where I need to input number. So ideally I would need somebody at home by PC and me on the phone telling what number to input into software. But again, any casino will escort you out if you spend hours on the phone.

Need some advice how to work it out :D
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Number counting wont get you far - The historical patterns of the numbers has no effect on the next number, so is impossible to predict. The same applies for the lottery numbers.

There was a fairly successful team of cheats that had devices under their clothes that would allow them to morse code details to each other. Rather than beeping a device would tap codes on the players legs. Didnt take long for the casinos to find it and ban them.

The problem now is that if you get banned from one casino you effectively get banned from every casino in the country.

Derren Brown started as a card counter and learnt a lot of his skills over the card table before he got banned from every casino in the land
 
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It always makes me chuckle when people try and apply maths in an attempt to win the lottery. It's got nothing to do with maths.

I had a system I used to use and I was in profit by playing the lottery. Never had any big wins, but I consistently matched 3 and occasionally 4 numbers. It was quite time consuming though and I got fed up of wading through statistics and the like twice a week.

You can, however, massively improve your chances by doing just a few simple things.
 
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Some numbers turn up all the time. I call these "the numbers which aren't on my ch*ffin' ticket".


James
 
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matt seymour said:
It always makes me chuckle when people try and apply maths in an attempt to win the lottery. It's got nothing to do with maths.

I had a system I used to use and I was in profit by playing the lottery. Never had any big wins, but I consistently matched 3 and occasionally 4 numbers. It was quite time consuming though and I got fed up of wading through statistics and the like twice a week.

You can, however, massively improve your chances by doing just a few simple things.
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This was the closest we got to making a profit as well - going for £10 wins rather than the big wins, but even then its hard work with very little reward.
 
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The data on past draws are available all over the internet but putting together any conclusive stats from them is very difficult. For example do you look at the stats as a whole or do you produce different stats for each set of balls and each machine. If you break it down to that level you will slight variations on how frequent each ball is drawn.

Most schemes tend to focus on working out the frequency of how often a ball is drawn e.g. every 8 weeks, or every 7 weeks etc. Then working out which balls are most overdue. The theory is that if ball number 10 is drawn every 8 weeks and hasn't been drawn for 12 weeks, it is more likely to be drawn than number 20 which is drawn every 9 weeks but was drawn 3 weeks ago. (What you then have to decide is do you ignore when it gets drawn as a bonus ball or not, as it has been physically drawn but not as a part of anything that is useful to you)

There are whole websites on different theories, but variations on that one is the most common.

I have to point out that it slightly increases the chances of predicting a win but not enough to put the odds in your favour. We do it as a group to explore different ways of looking at stats rather than trying to make any money out of it.
 
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I remember reading about a guy in America who would make massive place bets on horses via the US PMU.

He'd worked out that, if a horse's win odds were below a certain level, it's chances of placing were so high that the minimum place odds (1.05) were far too generous.

He made a lot of money doing this.

I can't remember how they closed that loophole.

Steve
 
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I Love Spreadsheets said:
The data on past draws are available all over the internet but putting together any conclusive stats from them is very difficult. For example do you look at the stats as a whole or do you produce different stats for each set of balls and each machine. If you break it down to that level you will slight variations on how frequent each ball is drawn.

Most schemes tend to focus on working out the frequency of how often a ball is drawn e.g. every 8 weeks, or every 7 weeks etc. Then working out which balls are most overdue. The theory is that if ball number 10 is drawn every 8 weeks and hasn't been drawn for 12 weeks, it is more likely to be drawn than number 20 which is drawn every 9 weeks but was drawn 3 weeks ago. (What you then have to decide is do you ignore when it gets drawn as a bonus ball or not, as it has been physically drawn but not as a part of anything that is useful to you)

There are whole websites on different theories, but variations on that one is the most common.

I have to point out that it slightly increases the chances of predicting a win but not enough to put the odds in your favour. We do it as a group to explore different ways of looking at stats rather than trying to make any money out of it.
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Yep, I've seen the systems you mention along with all the various wheels etc.

They are all pretty lazy and focus on what happens "most commonly"

If it were just a matter of picking common numbers or following a pattern, winning the lottery would be a piece of cake.

Certain things happen almost every single week such as what I call "adjacent numbers." These are basically numbers that are either side of a number drawn in the previous draw. For example, if 13 was drawn one week, the adjacents would be 12 and 14. Look at the recent results and you will see that adjacent numbers crop almost every draw. Sometimes 2 or even 3 are drawn.

There are loads of simple things like adjacent numbers that you can use to increase your chances of matching numbers.
 
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There is a method where you always bet on the favourite horse to win £10 (for example) - if that didnt win you would bet on the favourite in the next race so you would win £10 + what you lost on the previous race and so on and so on.

It would work if you had an infinite pile of cash. If you have a run of 8 horses failing to win you need to start placing bets worth hundreds of thousands of pounds. When you get to 10 or 12 failures you are talking millions of pounds. Runs of 10 races with no favourites winning happens almost every other week, so it is not a practical way of betting.

The neatest method I found was playing one bookie of against another for international events. If England were playing Germany, you could bet on Germany here in the UK and get better odds than you would if you bet on the UK. In Germany you would get better odds on the UK winning than you would Germany (Local crowds tend to bet on local teams, swinging the odds).

So if you bet on Germany to win in the UK and the UK to win in Germany, who ever won you would still be in profit.
 
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I Love Spreadsheets said:
The neatest method I found was playing one bookie of against another for international events. If England were playing Germany, you could bet on Germany here in the UK and get better odds than you would if you bet on the UK. In Germany you would get better odds on the UK winning than you would Germany (Local crowds tend to bet on local teams, swinging the odds).

So if you bet on Germany to win in the UK and the UK to win in Germany, who ever won you would still be in profit.
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That's like the Prix de L'Arc de Triomphe 2006.

Because the Japanese could bet on the French Tote - and because the Japanese bet big - their horse, Deep Impact, went off at 1.1 (10-1 on) in France.

However, he was available at 9/4 in the UK.

So punters in the UK were lumping on Deep Impact with the UK bookies/exchanges... and bettting the rest of the field at French odds.

It was a guaranteed winner.

The winner, Rail Link, was 8-1 in the UK... but I (and anyone else that bet French odds) got paid at 24.6 (i.e. 23.6-1) - almost 3 times the UK odds!

This sort of "dual pricing" happens a lot with the big French races. (And big UK races with short-priced French horses.)

Steve
 
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matt seymour said:
Certain things happen almost every single week such as what I call "adjacent numbers." These are basically numbers that are either side of a number drawn in the previous draw. For example, if 13 was drawn one week, the adjacents would be 12 and 14. Look at the recent results and you will see that adjacent numbers crop almost every draw.
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But wouldn't that be expected?

If you have 6 balls, each with 2 "adjacents", that's 12 numbers - i.e. roughly 1/4 of the numbers.

As you're drawing 6 from 49 numbers - 12 of which are "successes" - most weeks there'll be an "adjacent" drawn.

Steve
 
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Jeff, yep you can also place 3 bets, one for an England win, one for a German win and one for a draw and still come out with a profit.

The returns are not as much as a straight bet on one result, but if you do the maths right you will always win.

ThisThatAndTheOther - Spot on, all gambling set up's are designed to pay out less than they take in - pure and simple. As I said I'm just in it for the geeky maths challenge
 
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There is no way to predict lottery numbers using past draws (unless you believe that the balls are not all equal for some reason).

You can win the lottery if it gets to a certain payout where the money spent in buying all of the combinations is less than the win. But then you are still relying on no or limited jackpot winners etc.

You can win at roulette if you keep on doubling (plus a bit) but you'll need to find a table that has no limits and you'll also need to get your hands on millions.
 
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SteveGibson said:
But wouldn't that be expected?

If you have 6 balls, each with 2 "adjacents", that's 12 numbers - i.e. roughly 1/4 of the numbers.

As you're drawing 6 from 49 numbers - 12 of which are "successes" - most weeks there'll be an "adjacent" drawn.

Steve
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That's kind of the point I was making.

It happens nearly every single week. Adjacents virtually always show up, so pick at least one adjacent on every line you play. People don't consciously do it.

There are so many simple things you can do to increase your chances. If you want to take adjacent numbers on step further, you can do. Say for example number 6 would be an adjacent if it was drawn in the next draw. Go back and look at whether it was an adjacent the last time it was drawn. If it was, ask yourself how likely it is to be drawn as an adjacent twice in a row. It doesn't happen too often.

The system I used basically worked in reverse to most systems in so much as I tried to find reasons why a certain number wouldn't be drawn. Most systems work the opposite way around. I would go through the numbers using a whole lot of different mehtods to basically eliminate numbers one by one and significantly reduce the amount of numbers I was picking from.

It was quite complicated, but it sure did work and it's a whole lot better than picking numbers based on how frequently they are drawn, which is what every other system I have seen does.
 
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matt seymour said:
That's kind of the point I was making.

It happens nearly every single week. Adjacents virtually always show up, so pick at least one adjacent on every line you play. People don't consciously do it.
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I think we're making different points.

My point is that, without them being any better than any other number, you should still expect "adjacents" to turn up most weeks.

i.e. That what you're seeing is just a random distribution of 6 numbers picked from 49.

Steve
 
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There really is a sadness that surrounds the lottery. The hope that people put into it and there is so much more to life than money and there is something greater. Something so much greater and we have so many blessings to count, Not only for what we have but also for what we do not have.
 
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The lottery just opened a window for gambling and gaming per se. Not that I'm against a fair bet.

Can't stand that Barbara Winsor ad though!

As for the charity aspect of the lottery (insert zippy smiley).
 
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If I spelt her name right it was a mistake as I tried to spell it wrong an dmay have accidentally got it right!!

I am watching about a manbearpig!
 
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Business is business and surely there are more important crimes in the world than betting - dodgy or not! FB told me that capitalism and lots of other things suck and frankly I'm starting to believe her. ;)
 
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I don't think there is a theory of how to win the lottery it's just luck! I play lucky dip every week as I find it easier then picking my own numbers. Just don't forget to check your lottery results lottery.co.uk/results/
 
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SteveGibson said:
I think we're making different points.

My point is that, without them being any better than any other number, you should still expect "adjacents" to turn up most weeks.

i.e. That what you're seeing is just a random distribution of 6 numbers picked from 49.

Steve
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True to some extent, but countless thousands of people will pick their 6 numbers at random and not pick any adjacents, which pretty much guarantees that they won't win the jackpot because adjacents are almost always there. It's simple, pick some adjacent numbers and you increase your chances.

There are a lot of very simple things you can do to drastically increase your chances depending on how much effort you want to put in when choosing your numbers.
 
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matt seymour said:
True to some extent, but countless thousands of people will pick their 6 numbers at random and not pick any adjacents, which pretty much guarantees that they won't win the jackpot because adjacents are almost always there.
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They're almost always there because, if you take 12 numbers, you'll almost always have at least one show up. That's all.

It's simple, pick some adjacent numbers and you increase your chances.
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Nope.

There are a lot of very simple things you can do to drastically increase your chances
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Nope, it's random. No ball is any better than any of the others. ("It's a lottery", some might say.)

Steve
 
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SteveGibson said:
They're almost always there because, if you take 12 numbers, you'll almost always have at least one show up. That's all.



Nope.



Nope, it's random. No ball is any better than any of the others. ("It's a lottery", some might say.)

Steve
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We shall have to agree to disagree, but when I played the lottery using all manner of different things including adjacent numbers I won more than I spent on tickets.

It's surprisingly easy to increase your chances with a bit of effort. The fact that it is random actually makes some things predictable. It is possible to take an educated guess.
 
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It always creates me giggle when individuals try and implement mathematics in an make an effort to win the sweepstakes. It's got nothing to do with mathematics.
 
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The odds of winning are 14 million to one. The lottery is a game of chance, if it was mathematically capable of being code broken then it wouldn't be a game of chance. I think a lot of it is a load of balls actually. Either do your regular numbers and hope its your turn or do a lucky dip and swear at the cat when you get 'adjacent numbers'...Good Luck..Quo Vadis..Frank
 
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Funny enough, I have seen a map of UK where most of the winning lottery tickets where bouth :) So there is something about increasing your chances of winning.
 
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read 4 pages before realising it's an old thread but here is my take.

The original link appears to suggest the maths only works when a certain rollover is reached which boosts all the smaller prizes, the profit is made by winning a lot of smaller prizes not the jackpot. This could be mathematically guaranteed in certain circumstances, which these guys seem to have figured out. It's all about picking the right variety of combinations to cover 3,4,5 ball matches.

You have to remember this is a system based on one specific lottery system and only at certain times, it also seems to require investment of around 200,000 tickets!

I remember a system for roulette that can work to an extent but also like any gambling system fail quickly too. You bet on a colour, say Red. Start with the minimum bet, if you lose bet double again, when you win start again. There is usually a minimum and maximum bet so if you are lucky you can get 5 bets, 5 chances to win a 50-50 bet which I think is around 97%, when you lose though it is a large amount.
 
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It's the martingale system.

I was thinking of spread betting the Dow on the flip of a coin (heads buy, tails sell) using the martingale system to see how it would work out.

On a demo account of-course.
 
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