Michael Larson

About Michael Larson

Paul Michael Larson (May 10, 1949 – February 16, 1999) was a contestant on the United States television game show Press Your Luck. Larson's claim to fame was his winning $110,237 in cash and prizes, which he was able to do by memorizing the patterns used on the Press Your Luck game board.

Through a careful study of the "random" movements of the 18-square "Big Board" on the CBS game show Press Your Luck, Larson was able to determine that there were only five patterns used to determine the movements of the spinner used to award money on the show. He was able to discover this by using a VCR to pause a recorded episode of the game, and proceed frame by frame to learn the patterns. Armed with this knowledge, he found that it would be theoretically possible to go on the game show, watch the patterns carefully, and hit squares containing money consistently.

Two of the 18 squares on the game board (usually referred to as 4 and 8) always contained cash in round 1 (square 4 held $1,000, $1,250, and $1,500, while square 8 held $300, $450, and $550), as well as cash and an extra spin in round 2 (square 4 held $3,000 + ONE SPIN, $4,000 + ONE SPIN, and $5,000 + ONE SPIN, while square 8 held $500 + ONE SPIN, $750 + ONE SPIN, and $1,000 + ONE SPIN). They never contained the Whammy, the character in the show who takes away all cash and prizes a contestant has earned. Therefore, Larson reasoned, if he used his knowledge of the board patterns to stop on only those two squares, he could play on as long as he dared, never at risk of losing his money.