It's been a long week, it's late, I'm tired and it's All Hallow's Eve! (Halloween). So here's a quick story for y'all (sorry, but it's not scary).

In the very early days of my card counting career, I was part of a duo ( well trying to be anyway). We were a little naive and over optimistic at the time on all the fortunes that card-counting was going to bring us, but we weren't stupid. We did our research, studied the art of counting cards and practised.

One of the first things you learn about card counting is that it is based on the fact that the player has an advantage when the deck is heavy in 10's and A's. One of the reasons for this is that it increases the chances of the player getting a blackjack.

When we first hit the tables, we started to notice that there were times when a certain number would clump together. More often than not, it was the tens (makes sense since there are 4x the number of tens than any other card). We weren't the only ones. Other players at the table noticed it too.

"Man, look at all those 10's!" was uttered more than once by ploppies sitting next to me. Even the ploppies know the tens are good.

However, what interested me and my partner was when all the A's came together. We realised that if we could track those A's during the shuffle, then we were going to significantly increase the odds of predicting a blackjack. (I later learned that this is called shuffle tracking).

One time, I was playing alone with my partner watching and counting along for practice (I know - great cover eh? We were young and stupid). I noticed that there was a clump of 5 aces with some 10's as well. They came near the end of the shoe, so I knew where they were pre-shuffle.

Now, the dealers shuffle was weak. He shuffled once through and presented me the deck for cutting. I knew roughly where those aces were, but added a few cards buffer. I winked to my partner and said brashly: "Watch this.".

The first hand I played a normal bet (single unit). A bunch of 10's dropped, but no aces. The next hand I bumped my bet up to 10 units. I could feel the glare of my partner as he was in shock at what I was doing. There was no way that I was supposed to be ramping bets after the first hand. With mostly 10's, the shoe was already going against me. But I could smell thoses Aces. I was confident of my cut, and I knew they were on the way.

Lo and behold, the dealer dealt me 2 blackjacks, and a A7 for himself!

I turned to my partner with a smug smile. He couldn't believe what I had done, and honestly neither could I. It was luck - but I pulled it off!

Yes, it was stupid shuffle tracking without actually practising it first and I got lucky to get 2 blackjacks, but if I make that same play enough to get into the long run, it's a winning play, and that is what card counting is all about.

Have a good Halloween all!