Intan Pragi – Roulette’s Marathon Man

We all try to go above and beyond at work, but the Estonian croupier Intan Pragi took things to a whole new level when he undertook a marathon shift as a roulette croupier.

A typical casino dealer – including live dealers at an online casino – might expect to work an eight-hour shift before they get to go home and put their feet up. Not for Intan Pragi though!

On 20th February 2005, the professional croupier succeeded in his world record attempt, becoming the first (and, so far, only) croupier to work a non-stop 48-shift.

During his marathon roulette session, he managed to spin the wheel more than 1,650 times. As any seasoned player will tell you, a standard European roulette wheel contains 37 individually numbered pockets. That means the ball landed in each of these pockets (including zero) around 44 times during his considerably lengthy workday.

Pragi is still featured in the Guinness Book of World Records, more than 16 years after his momentous achievement. Not to mention he still works at the same casino establishment where he did it. How’s that for dedication?

Other Gambling Records

August 2025 will see the Guinness World Records celebrate its 100th birthday, therefore, to honour the upcoming milestone, let’s take a look at the other gambling records to have had a home in popular books – and also those ones that didn’t quite make it, but still drive fascination and discussion in the gambling sector to this very day.

Largest Casino Jackpot

The largest single slot machine payout occurred at Excalibur Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, United States of America, in 2003. The jackpot fell just shy of $40million at $39,700,000, and if that number isn’t eye-watering enough for you, with inflation, if you hit the equivalent win today, you’d almost double the value at just under $68million!

Largest Poker Tournament

Back in 2006, the World Series of Poker (WSOP) hosted an event that saw a remarkable 8,773 entrants enter. Although since that landmark, there have been multiple larger ones (WSOP broke 28,371 players in 2019), we always feel it is important to mark the trailblazers – after all, it’s hardest being the first.

Most Expensive Single Bet

A legendary name in the gambling circuit, even still to this day, despite his passing in 2024, is Archie Karas.

Although we are bending the rules slightly, as the Karas’ bet isn’t officially recognised as a Guiness Book of World Records entry, it would be remiss of us to not include. Taking place at Binion’s Horseshoe Casino in Las Vegas, Karas waged $1million on a single poker hand, and this is often noted as one of the biggest, if not the biggest, single bet in gambling history.

Most Expensive Casino Chip

A poker chip that Archie Karas no doubt would’ve enjoyed getting his hands on would’ve been the $100,000 poker chip issued by the Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas – it is recognised as one of the highest denomination of casino chips in the world.

Largest Roulette Wheel

When your roulette wheel measures an incredible 13 meters (42.65 feet) in diameter, it’s hard not to think it is more like the TV game show Wheel of Fortune than a Roulette wheel. But that’s exactly what the Monte Carlo Casino in Monaco achieved, when they commissioned the construction of the largest-ever Roulette wheel for a special promotional event.

The Monte Carlo Incident

Keeping things in Monaco, but transporting you back to 1913, a Roulette wheel iconically landed on black 26, 12 – yep, 12! – times in a row. Given the randomness of Roulette, you can imagine the excitement it prompted then and even now, some 112 years later!

Lucky Colour Red

Continuing on the same vein as the 1913 black 26, we jump forward a little bit to 1923 and to an American casino where the croupier spun the white ball round the table, only to find a red pocket, a remarkable 32 times in a row.

Most Blackjack Hands Played in One Hour

Some players opt for speed at the Blackjack table, whilst others opt for skill. Frank Scoblete, though? Well, he opted for both. He managed to play 429 hands of blackjack in one hour at Las Vegas, a feat that required both speed and skill, and finds itself amongst some of the more unique Guinness world records.