[Lottery Quiz] Question 3 – Getting Wheely Good Now

polarskateChief Polar Bear has a new toy – but it’s much misunderstood in the North Pole this concept of ‘wheels’.

It works, but sometimes he can’t help thinking the hype is better than the reality. (Especially when it comes to skateboards in the snow, and it tends to do the snow thing a lot round here).

So Chief Bear has heard of ‘wheeling’ (sometimes called a ‘system play’). It’s all about combining a set of numbers together in a special way. It sounds complicated but there’s a lot of hype about it and people seem to win jackpots doing it so it must be good..?

He’s also heard that wheeling can be quite costly as you need to play lots of entries.

But that makes it perfect for his new North Pole Lottery syndicate. We’ve got the fish funds for 50 plays so that should be enough to give it a try.

Here Is Quiz Question No.3

You’ve probably heard of wheeling too. It’s been around almost as long as modern lottery games have.

But what is the benefit/point of wheeling?

Here’s Where To Post Your Answers (& Bag A Prize)

You have 3 different ways you can enter (only 1 needed):-

1. Add your answer to this post on Facebook OR

2. Reply to this Tweet on Twitter OR

3. Add a comment on this Google+ Post

As always I look forward to reading your answers. Don’t forget, there are no ‘wrong’ answers here – it’s all a learning experience – so any sensible answer counts towards entering the competition.

NOTE: Don’t forget you need to leave an answer for ALL THREE questions to qualify for the prizes. There is still time to add an answer for Question 1 here and Question 2 here.

Look out for my answer to Question 3 right here in a few days time – together with details of those lucky prize winners 🙂

My Answer

Wheeling makes my head hurtWheeling is NOT complicated, and shouldn’t make your head hurt!

But it is frequently misunderstood. Most of that blame goes to certain people who sell wheeling books and software – in particular the ones who make silly claims in order to sell more of their books.

So wheeling is NOT the miracle jackpot busting system many people are led to believe.

But don’t get me wrong, wheeling is useful. But it’s just one more Strategy to add to the list. Because it is better to wheel than not.

There are FOUR reasons why:-

1. Improving your chances of winning smaller prizes.

Which helps keep things interesting while you wait for a big win. You do however need to choose the right win guarantee for the game you’re playing. There’s not much point choosing a Match 3 guarantee if that game only pays for Match 4 and above.

2. The chance of multiple smaller prizes.

Because you are combining the same numbers in different ways, when you get e.g. a Match 4 win, it’s likely you also get a number of Match 3 wins at the same time, depending on the system used.

3. Maximize your analysis efforts.

If you are analysing to try and predict the lottery numbers for tonight then it allows you to combine your selected numbers to maximize your chances of a prize from them. That is, if you’ve come up with a list of 12 numbers you think are good, how are you going to play them – just 2 combinations of 6? What if you get all 6 numbers, but only 3 on each line..?

4. The fun factor.

This does matter. The smug lottery haters out there deride lottery players for throwing money away (ever heard the often quoted yet eminently dull “the lottery is a tax on the stupid”?). Which just shows how clueless they are – could they ever win a life changing sum of money from going to see a movie? Or playing a round of golf? Or any of the other thousands of things that people do for FUN.

Because if you enjoy playing the lottery, then from pure entertainment value alone you can never actually lose. Ever paid to see a bad movie at your local multiplex and walked out thinking there’s 2 hours of your life you’ll never get back..? Wheeling just adds another layer of entertainment to playing, just like analysing past results hoping to find some bias in your favour.

What It Is NOT

What wheeling does not do is ‘magically’ increase your chances of winning the jackpot. It doesn’t hurt them either of course. But assuming a perfectly random draw, 50 wheeled combinations have exactly the same chance of hitting the jackpot as 50 quick picks.

(Whether draws are perfectly random or not is something we already discussed – which relates to point 3 above too).

If playing wheeled numbers means you play more combinations than usual, then yes of course, that will increase your chances of winning the jackpot. We know that from our North Pole lottery syndicate.

The Point Is

Even if you got 4 of the numbers drawn, you can find they are spread across your 50 quick picks in such a way that you win nothing.

I’m sure you’ve seen this happen on tickets where you’ve bought lots of lines – you’re ticking off most of the numbers but no more than 1 or 2 are on each line.

“Look I’ve got 6 numbers, but won nothing again!” said the lottery player who didn’t use a wheeling system.

But if you combine those numbers using the right kind of wheeling system, then you know for certain that if you get 4 numbers, you win at least a Match 4 prize. It is therefore better than not wheeling.

I’ll leave the last word on the ‘why’ to the world expert on this specific topic, Iliya Bluskov*:-

“Let us compare playing with 20 random tickets against 20 tickets chosen according to our lottery system… if any 4 of the numbers drawn are among the 10 numbers chosen by you, then the 20 tickets of the lottery system guarantee at least one 4-win, while 20 random tickets (on the same 10 numbers) guarantee nothing!”

* Bluskov is a working university Professor with an M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Mathematics, who has spent many years researching combinatorics (i.e. the branch of math that wheeling systems fall into). He’s the only author who has actually created world record breaking wheeling systems.

So What Should I Do?

If you would like to start wheeling your entries, dive in. It is not hard to do. Creating good wheeling systems is very difficult. But you don’t have to create them, you just use them, and that’s easy.

A Warning: the internet as usual is full of very helpful but entirely useless stuff. So you can find lots of free wheeling systems out there, but typically they are put up by people who didn’t create them and don’t understand them. So you have no idea what you are really getting.

Or to put it another way, if you going to be spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars of lottery tickets over the next year alone – isn’t it worth spending $20 to get the right system designed by someone who does know what they are doing?

So don’t be a cheapskate, get a copy of Bluskov’s wheeling systems, or if you want something less manual give Win Lotto Systems a try.

About Those Prize Winners

Don’t worry – I haven’t forgotten. The winners of the 1st ever LG Lottery Quiz have been selected, courtesy of the randomness of random.org.

The 1st prize of 12 Months Membership to my Strategy Group went to Charles W. from Arizona, who was excited to get signed up and started.

The 2nd prize of Iliya Bluskov’s “Combinatorial Lottery Systems with Guaranteed Wins” book went to Joe A. from Jerusalem. Joe went with the 6 ball version of Iliya’s book (he does one book for games with 5 main balls and another for those with 6 main balls).

So Congratulations again to both our winners.

Here ends the first ever LG Lottery Quiz. It’s been a lot of fun, so thank you all once again for playing along.

26 Comments so far ↓

  • HGA

    Hi,
    I use a very, very, VERRRY simple wheeling system for 9 numbers – but not every time I play.

    1,2,3
    4,5,6
    7,8,9

    Take the 1st row and play it with the 2nd row (i.e. 1,2,3,4,5,6)
    Take the 2nd row and play it with the 3rd row (i.e. 4,5,6,7,8,9)
    Take the 1st row and play it with the 3rd row (i.e. 1,2,3,7,8,9)

    You can also play the three columns in a similar manner.

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