Crossword Help Forum
Forum Rules

I won the Sunday Times twice last year, with only 4 weeks between the wins. I was very surprised about the first win, as I had been entering for about 4 years without luck, and I am one of those people "who never win anything " But the second win completely floored me, especially after such a short time. I thought that a mistake must have been made but the wonderful solid silver fountain pen arrived the following week. I kept one and sold the second one on ebay for £165, so I was best pleased to say the least ! I guess you just have to keep on trying.

After about 20 years of regularly entering the Daily Telegraph crossword I won the consolation prize. Two weeks later I won the Telegraph Pen. Recently I won a consolation £25 from the Sunday Express. I am still waiting for the Times Pen, the Jumbo books, The Sunday Express £1,000, and the Skeleton, The Week Radio and a prize from the Oldie Genius crossword. I shall keep trying - goodness only knows what I've spent on stamps through the years!

Good Luck to you one and all.
Dandelion

I won the Sunday Post £100 prize crossword late last year, thus fulfilling my lifelong ambition ignited when playing Monopoly as a child ('You have won £100 in a crossword competition')!
Couldn't believe my luck, although I also spend a fortune in stamps.

I always enter- Sunday Post, Sir Lancelot Mos, MoS 'You' Crossword and Pick Me Up prize crossword. Sometimes I enter the Mos General Knowledge -£1500 is not to be sniffed at.

But I would love the Sir Lancelot fountain pen, as I only use fountain pens (except, ironically when I'm doing crosswords - it's the paper) and am obsessed with them.

I'm impressed by some of the number of wins on here - just goes to show it can happen!

Won 2 Wee Stinker T-shirts (approximately 12 years between wins and the design is still the same)
Won £100 on 4 occasions in Scottish Daily Express Keith`s Crossword on a Friday plus numerous runners-up prizes of a bottle of malt whisky over the years in the same crossword.
Won a few book tokens in local paper crosswords too.

Would someone like to have a go at estimating chances of being pulled out of the hat. You would need to know readership figure then take a guess at percentage likely to be cryptophyllic!!!!!
The answer might encourage ( or not)(certainly one or the other - so a certainty)
Also has anyone actually witnessed a pull out of the hat/bag/box?

I submit 4 crossword solutions each week: my local (city) paper which I have one maybe half a dozen times ( £10 prize, which has just been increased to £25); local provincial paper which I have won perhaps 10 times (with the name of other family members); the RTE Guide which I have won once (100 euros) and The Observer Everyman which I have never won. It's one of my modest ambitions to win it.

i won ten million pounds last week

I've been submitting prize crosswords since about 1971. Every week I submit 13 or 14 solutions (14 only when I can finish the Listener). I tackle them in this order.
1. Spectator(Won £30 1st time I entered Nov 2010)
2. Sat Times (Won twice)
3. Sat Guardian (Won several Dictionaries)
4. Independent (Won OUP books many times. I always rate the Independent as my "most likely")
5. Observer Everyman (Won once)
6. STimes (Won 2 runners up Cross ballpoints)
7. IoS (Won Oxford dictionaries several times)
8. Observer Everyman. (2 Book tokens)
9. Times Jumbo Cyptic (Never won)
10. IoS Beelzebub (again several wins)
11. ST Mephisto (3 wins in 40 years)
12. Observer AZED (Won plain twice, had 2 VHCs in the clue setting competition, including the MM crossword in 1999/2000
13. STelegraph EV (only recently done these. No wins)
14. The Listener. (No wins. Lucky if I complete. Longest run is 10 completions in a row.)

I have a kind of Crossword OCD, which leaves me bereft if for some reason I can't do this every week. When I think of the stamps, I console myself that it is a small price to pay for staving off Alzheimers.

Well it's OK for you guys. I've never won bugger all. Mind you, I've never sent one in either. I do the daily mail most days and,er,that's it. Oh, I occasionally do the DT when staying at a friends house.

truast,

WAY TOO GO!