Cycles, Revisited

[larbec]

Are there cycles like this with every game, even the state lottos like The Texas Two Step or Lotto Texas?

 

[Icewynd]

Yes, every game has a cycle. A cycle is defined as the number of draws required to play every number in the matrix.

So, for Pick 3 the cycle would be relatively short, while for Mega Millions it would take a long time to get all 75 numbers out.

I believe Lotto Texas has 56 numbers? So It would have a longer cycle than 6/49.

Good Luck!

 

[larbec]

Thanks Ice

I gave to sit back and chuckle a little .... Hmmm... The lotto is "random" yet they "claim" to have a guarantee each number will be drawn at the end of the cycle. I'm understanding this to be correct or "can" some go past their cycle time!

 

[Frank]

The new UK lotto 759 is a good example of this, with a statistical average cycle length of 37 draws, it has had 56 draws and we are still waiting for no 45 to be drawn to complete the cycle. There are no guarantees, just statistics. I will worry if it gets to 68 draws since in my trials over 6000 cycles that was the maximum possible.

 

[larbec]

Interesting Frank, I'll have to take a look at our local state lotteries. Do you use an excel formula or Macro to figure out what hasn't played yet or the duration of the cycles or just do it the old fashion way of data sorting!

 

[Frank]

I have an Excel counting grid that adds one to the previous count of each ball since the cycle started. It also notes how many undrawn balls are drawn so far in the cycle, and how many are still to come. Its important to remember that the cycle start draw has to be reset once the previous cycle is completed, so the grid resets to zero apart from the first seven balls drawn in the new cycle, whose counts become 1 ! That's a manual thing done by me when the bell rings (to warn me the cycle has ended).

 

[larbec]

Are you using formulas or a macro? It would seem you could use a macro as a reset back to zero,

So, it you have 69 balls you don't reset it back to 0 until ALL have played?

 

[Frank]

For the specific analysis of the CURRENT cycle in real time , I use formulas, but I use a macro to play a sound to draw my attention to the end of the cycle. I don't particularly want or need to automatically reset it once every 20 weeks or so.

The start of the cycle is a named range, so I just go into name manager and change the address of that named range, it takes about 10 seconds.

Yes, you don't reset (all balls to zero ) until all your 69 balls have been drawn, but this in practice means that the first draw of the new cycle ( which is the draw after the one where the final ball(s) were drawn) will have seven balls with a count of 1, and (69-7) undrawn balls. There is never a situation where the drawn ball count is zero .
For historical analysis looking back over years of draws, i used a macro and formulas to scan the results and flag up the start of each new cycle and count cycle lengths.

 

[larbec]

Hmmm, this caught my attention lol okay, when you back tested how were the results? Were the beneficial to help you make decisions today?

 

[Icewynd]

I would say the methodology is helpful. I divides the balls into 2 groups and gives guidelines as to how many hits can reasonably be expected from each group. It is most useful in the middle of the cycle when the groups are most similar in size, and less useful at the beginning and the end of the cycle when you have few numbers in one group or the other.

BTW, nice to see you again. Its been a while.

Good Luck!

 

[Frank]

I haven't been into cycle analysis that long. I did it out of interest after Icewynd published details of the methodology. I did publish some details of my results earlier in this thread, but the UK Lotto is still in its first cycle of the new matrix after 57 draws (way over average), with just one ball to be drawn to complete the cycle. With the last 20 draws creating newly drawn balls at this rate:-
2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

theres not much help coming from this !

 

[larbec]

Thanks ice, lots of personal stuff going on from raising my 2 1/2 year old grandson since age 1 month to a nasty pulled groin muscle injured twice within 3 months ..... I'm getting too old for this stuff lol

I'll have to play around with excel and perhaps our lotto Texas or two step since there has not been any matrix changes in years. Actually never in the two step.

I'm not familiar enough with name range like your doing Frank so I'll read up on it