How do you keep current on all the latest blackjack information? You purchase the latest book on blackjack and you subscribe to some of the blackjack newsletters and magazines that are on the market. You surf the internet, and most of all, you visit casinos. You don’t have to play in every casino you visit; you can stop-look-listen while in those facilities, and that in itself will help you to gain additional information.
Take a look at “Casino City Times – Gaming Gurus” on the internet. It has over five dozen authors writing articles who have loads of gambling experience. Every week new articles appear, dealing with blackjack and all the games normally found in today’s casinos.
Start your own library of books and articles you run across. Visit bookstores for the latest books and magazines. Look for older books at garage sales and used bookstores. Here is where you find the classics like
Beat the Dealer by Edward Thorp and
World's Greatest Blackjack Book by Lance Humble. They might be old, but they are still part of the basic knowledge you need to build on to become a successful player.
Knowledge is a major ingredient when it comes to winning in the casino. In general, the odds on all the games are in favor of the house. But, knowledge is what separates winners from losers. Remember, there are players out there who visit casinos on a regular basis who make their living gambling. Maybe you don’t want to be a professional, but you want to have the skills that it takes to be a constant winner.
Look at it from your past school experience. To get a good grade in a class you had to take in high school or college required you to do some work. You studied the text, made lots of notes during class, went to the library to read more about the subject, got a follow classmate to help tutor you and the next thing you know you got an A! Now maybe you never bothered to read about the subject again or use in your work or social life; however, the steps you took to get the A can be the same when it comes to obtaining knowledge for playing in a casino. Knowledge is what separates winners from losses.
BET YOU DIDN'T KNOW
• Trivia is considered just one small step on the road to higher knowledge.
• Even though a knowledgeable player can reduce the house edge to less than 2% at craps, the Nevada Gaming Commission reports that casinos are earning approximately 14% returns from the game.
• When you see professional gamblers who play the horses, or sports betters, blackjack and poker players, along with video poker professionals, the one thing they all have in common is knowledge.
• On five occasions, betting on the Belmont Stakes was as easy as flipping a coin. There were five times when the race had only two horses in the field: 1887, 1888, 1892, 1910 and 1920.
• The ancient Greeks awarded celery to winners of sports events, and it often was carried by marathon runners.
• In the 1930s, during the depression, movie houses offered a one-night-a-week variation of bingo call "screeno." Each customer received a type of a bingo card, and winners were determined by a drawing during the evening.
• At one time during the late 1970s, $11 million won in state lotteries throughout the U.S. went unclaimed by winners.
• The Mills slot machine of 1910 had cherries, oranges and plums as winners. If a lemon appeared no prize would be awarded. This is why the lemon came to mean something unsatisfactory or defective.
