Serious lottery players have spent years developing formulas for cracking the big prize pools and it’s a safe bet all of these methods will be used this week.
The $100million up for grabs in this Thursday’s Powerball’s draw 1414 is the biggest prize pool of the year and second largest in Australian history, as players look for an edge to become the latest division one winner.
From systems entries to mathematic formulas and even meditation to ‘manifest’ the correct numbers, previous winners’ stories about when they bought their lucky ticket might now help others.
It’s been six Powerball draws since the last division one winner was called and The Lott has estimated that up to half of Australia’s adult population could fork out for a ticket this week in hopes to break that streak.
So how can you get ahead of the pack?
The $100 million up for grabs in this Thursday’s Powerball’s draw 1414 is the biggest prize pool of the year and second largest in history
From systems entries to mathematic formulas and even meditation to ‘manifest’ the correct numbers, previous winners’ stories about when they bought their lucky ticket might now help others
Manifesting the result
A Gympie couple won last Tuesday’s Set for Life draw and credited their massive $4.8million win to manifesting the result through meditation.
‘We’ve often dreamt about winning Set for Life, but never have expected it to ever happen. It’s something we’ve manifested and my wife has meditated about it,’ the unnamed man told a Lott spokesperson.
After recovering from the initial shock that left them feeling ‘woozy and weak in the knees’, the two started planning what to do with the haul.
‘We can’t wait to help our children and grandchildren – it’s going to do such wonderful things,’ the husband said.
Also on the cards were home renovations, and an overseas tour to Bali and then Italy.
Their winnings will be doled out to them in monthly $20,000 instalments over the next 20 years.
Same Numbers
Another couple from Dapto, just south of Wollongong, had their lives changed forever after doubling up on their tickets to win $2million in March
The husband explained that he’d bought two tickets with the same numbers that his wife had been using for decades.
Both tickets ended up being division one winners, netting the pair $1million each – and it was pure dumb luck that made him buy two that week.
His wife had become angry with him when he forgot to call into the newsagents to buy a lucky ticket the week before, so he’d doubled up just to be safe.
‘Lo and behold, this morning she kept crossing off number after number on her ticket, and once we realised we’d won $1million on one ticket, I thought I should probably tell her about the second identical ticket too,’ he told Lotto.
‘My wife has played these numbers for almost three decades and has always said they’d be drawn one day.’
The wife confessed that she screamed once she found out they had won $1million, but almost fell unconscious after her husband revealed they had doubled their money with the duplicate ticket.
‘I can buy my daughter a house, I can set up the children and grandchildren for the future,’ they said.
A Gympie couple who recently won a Set for Life draw credited their massive $4.8 million win to manifesting the result through meditation
Another couple from Dapto, just south of Wollongong, had their lives changed forever after doubling up on their tickets to win $2million in March
Formula
One man became so good at claiming lottery wins that two of the most prosperous countries in the world had to change their rules to stop him.
Mathematician Stefan Mandel, a Romanian-born Australian citizen, won the lotto in Romania after using his smarts to beat the system.
With his first winnings, the brain box packed up his bags and moved to Australia where he went on to win another 12 draws before authorities caught wind of what was happening.
While working as an economist in Romania, Mr Mandel created a formula that he believed would lead to a win.
He created a 100 per cent chance of successfully landing five out of the six necessary numbers to hit the jackpot.
All he had to do was guess the sixth.
In Australia, the chances of someone winning a major lottery are approximately 14 million-to-one.
Due to this immensity of possible combinations, the formula needed to be altered.
His solution: scoop up as many tickets for each major draw as possible.
Mr Mandel raised funds through investors, to purchase enough tickets to invest in every possible combination of numbers.
After his formula became finite, Mr Mandel honed his focus on major prizes offering more money.
Now with a shortlist of the most likely numbers, he began the work of buying every ticket he could.
Despite the legality of his activities, it was deemed not in the spirit of the game and a series of laws were introduced making it illegal for one man to purchase all the tickets in a lottery.
Since the jig was up in Australia, Mr Mandel looked across the globe and targeted another market where his game would once again be legal.
The major jackpot in Virginia, USA, was his next target.
He immediately got to work on cracking the American system, with the Virginia jackpot having 7.1million possible outcomes.
At $1 per ticket, he enlisted a group of 2,500 Australian investors to pour in $2,500 each so that by the time the 1992 jackpot came around his team could handily purchase every single ticket once again.
The group won the $27million dollar top prize, along with numerous other division wins which netted a total profit in excess of $30million.
‘I knew that I would win one first prize, six second prizes, 132 third prizes, and thousands of minor prizes,’ he told Planet Money.
It resulted in a four-year legal battle, which saw the syndicate investigated by the likes of the CIA and FBI, however suspicions went unfounded.
Once again, laws were changed to outlaw Mr Mandel’s technique.
Mathematician Stefan Mandel, a Romanian-born Australian citizen, won the lotto in Romania after using his smarts to beat the system
Playing the percentages
Keeping with a more scientific approach, The Lott has compiled statistics showing what most winners have in common.
The findings show that around 66 per cent of people buy their tickets from a newsagent or pharmacy and usually stick to the same location, with some buying their ticket the same time on the same day of each week.
As far as winning strategies go, five of the eight Powerball division one winners in 2023 have chosen their own ticket numbers.
Although, to put a pin in that strategy, most of the big winners outside of this year have left it up to QuickPicks to randomly generate their winning numbers.
Reducing the odds of losing further, half of the top tickets have been PowerHit entries, which guarantees that the ticket will include the Powerball number players need to win.
Without that specific Powerball number, regardless of how many others a person guesses correctly, the Division One prize will be out of reach.
Without that specific Powerball number, regardless of how many others a person guesses correctly, the Division One prize will be out of reach
Outside of the Powerball number, however, the data also lists which are the ‘hottest’, or more likely to be drawn, and which are ‘cold’.
The hot numbers are: 17, 7, 9, 2 and 28.
The coldest, or least drawn, are: 31, 33, 34, 15 and 6.
As for the best and worst single Powerball numbers, data suggests that 3 and 19 are the best picks while 14 and 6 are the worst.
Location also plays a part in success, with each of the states having a 2023 division one win, but only NSW boasts having three thus far.
SA has netted two, while the others only have one.
With a total of $154,152,386.88 having been claimed on winning tickets this year alone, if there is only one division one winner for the latest draw that number will almost double.
‘If just one person scores the entire $100m prize on Thursday night, they’ll not only receive a substantial boost to their bank account just in time for the new financial year but also be crowned the second biggest Australian lottery winner ever,’ the Lott’s James Eddy said.
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