How Did a Math Expert Win the Lottery 14 Times?

Winning the lottery isn’t THAT easy, so how did a Romanian mathematician win 14 times?

Get ready to read about one of the most astounding winners in lottery history!

Stefan Mandel, a Romanian-Australian economist, seems to have hacked the system, allowing him to win huge prizes and become outrageously rich. Mandel made his first two wins in Romania, where he perfected his system. At the time, Mandel’s salary was just $88 dollars per month and he was looking for any way to get his family out of the then-communist country. When considering this, we definitely understand why he was so determined to become the ultimate winner.

Mandel achieved his goal when he was able to flee Romania to Israel and from there to Australia, where he proceeded to win the lottery 12 times.

While many lottery winners spend their prizes on expensive homes and cars, Mandel seemed to go an entirely different direction: He concocted a scheme that would allow him to win the lottery again and again. Mandel came up with a 6-step formula to winning the lottery:

Find out how many different winning number combinations are possible using the n! / r! * (n – r)! equation.
Make sure the jackpot is three times (or more) the number of combinations you found in step 1.
Buy a ticket for each combination (Mandel had to use the help of investors as ticket prices quickly added up).
Print out all the tickets. Remember, this used to be legal until Mandel won 14 times.
Bring the tickets to a lottery dealer.
Win!

You’ll notice that printing your own lottery tickets is no longer possible. This was allowed in times when printing was not as common as it is today, back when no one even imagined someone like Mandel would win the lottery so many times.

Mandel has retired in the small Island of Vanuatu in the South Pacific.