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    James Holzhauer Explains the Strategy Behind His <em>Jeopardy</em> Winning Streak

    There are three things that give the seemingly unstoppable contestant an advantage—and this isn’t the first time he’s succeeded on a game show.
    by Joe Pinsker Apr 24, 2019 6 minutes
    Source: Jeopardy Productions / Katie Martin / The Atlantic

    Updated at 3:21 p.m. ET on April 24, 2019

    On an episode of Jeopardy that aired Tuesday evening, James Holzhauer became the fastest-ever contestant on the show to earn $1 million in prize money. During his now 14-game win streak, he has seemed unstoppable, usually pulling away from his competitors early in the game and piling up money at an unprecedented rate: He’s winning more than twice as much per game as the Jeopardy legend Ken Jennings did during a record-setting 2004 run on the show. And Holzhauer’s highest daily prize yet, $131,127, exceeds the previous record holder’s one-day sum by more than $50,000.

    What makes Holzhauer so dominant? When I asked him, he was able to sum up his game plan pretty easily: “I sketched out what I believed to be my optimal strategy for Jeopardy: Play fast, build a stack, bet big, and hope for the best,” Holzhauer wrote to me in an email. “In my mind, playing a seemingly risky game actually minimizes my chances of losing.”

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