The Bonoloto draw on Wednesday, July 30 left a strange image: 127 HOLDING DEL SECOND PRIZE. To put it in perspective, the probability of hitting that category is 1 between 2.3 million. The normal thing is usually that in that category there are between 0 and 4 winners, no more than a hundred.
Awarded numbers explain everything: 3, 7, 23, 33, 43, 48, with 13 as complementary.
The combination immediately lets smell an irresistible pattern for many players:
- Four numbers finished in 3.
- The mythical 7.
- And the superstitious 13.
That is: all finishes in ‘3’, and ‘7’.
Image: Lotteries and bets of the State.
It is the perfect cocktail of what is often called “special numbers”: figures that the human mind perceives as more likely or lucky, although mathematically they are not. In Forocoches, the anomalous amount of success and the obvious explanation spotted both.
Many people systematically play numbers that follow visual or symbolic patterns. All finished in the same figure, “beautiful” numbers such as 7, important dates. What they do not calculate is that, If one day they are lucky, they will share it with thousands of people who thought exactly the same. And that has happened.
A classic experiment shows that if you ask people to choose “random” numbers, systematically avoid consecutive and tend to distribute them by tens. The result: predictable patterns.
The previous day there were only 3 lucky in this category. Almost 70,000 euros each took. That day they went to 1,783 euros, just the average net salary in Spain. The next day there was no reminding. It is not the first recent anomaly: in 2023 it came out practically the same winning combination in two draws with just 48 hours apart, changing only one number.
It is a bitter lesson of applied statistics: In gambling, as important as luck is originality. The paradox is that the numbers that seem “less random”-as 1-2-3-4-5-6-are statistically the smartest: you have the same chances of getting hit, but almost nobody else plays them.
The next time you see a consecutive combination in a raffle, do not surprise yourself if there are few winners. It will be the day that mathematicians are formed.
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Outstanding image |
