The Magic Cafe Forums - How Kevin King demonstrates memorizing playing cards

How Kevin King demonstrates memorizing playing cards

I got permission from Kevin King (Nashville, Tennessee memory expert and magician) to share his technique of memorizing a deck of shuffled cards and calling back the values as a demonstration of memory power. He normally only does this for a small group of people on an informal basis.

How Kevin King demonstrates the memorization of a shuffled deck of 40 cards (the Court cards are not used, they are removed for his demonstration):

For this demonstration he has a special memory palace with four rooms and each room has five Loci. He mentally has an offset number for each room: The first room offset is zero, the second room offset is 10, the third room offset is 20, and the fourth room offset is 30.

Each two cards form a two-digit number. He equates that two-digit number to the object in his 00-99 permanent Major System list and mentally stores that object on the next available Loci in the room he's mentally in (starting with the first room).

Note that the tens (10S, 10H, 10C, 10D), each are mentally encoded as a single zero.

So for example let's say the shuffled deck of 40 cards are:

4D, 5C, 5H, 7C, AH, 7H, 2H, AC, 9H, 10S, 3C, 10H, 8C, 9D, 10C, 3D, 2C, 8S, 8H, 5S, 2S, 6C, 9S, 7S, 5D, 3H, 4S, 6D, 4H, AD, 9C, 7D, 6S, AS, 10D, 3S, 4C, 6H, 8D, 2D

In room A (offset zero):
45 57 17 21 90 (Rail, Lock, Duck, Net, Bus)

In room B (offset 10):
30 89 03 28 85 (Mice, VP, Swim, kNife, File)

In room C (offset 20):
26 97 53 46 41 (Nacho, Pig, Llama, Roach, Rat)

In room D (offset 30):
97 61 03 46 82 (Pig, Shoot, Swim, Roach, Fan)

So in the example above in the first room (room A): the first piece of furniture would have a RAIL from a railroad track sticking up, the second piece of furniture would have a LOCK sitting in it, the third piece of furniture has a DUCK quacking, the fourth piece of furniture would have a fishing NET, and the last piece of furniture in that room would have a toy BUS.

Also you could use a story to mentally link the five items in the room by saying: "A railroad RAIL is hitting a LOCK to try to free a DUCK caught in a NET and put on a school BUS so he won't be a quack".

The call back to the audience:
Since his words represent two digits which are based on the Major System he knows that RaiL (because of the R and L) means a four then a five. And so on.

I tried to tell Kevin that he has a unique way of demonstrating card memorization, but he downplays any uniqueness saying his technique is no different than somebody memorizing a bunch of digits of pi which a lot of memory competitors use.

But I do believe his overall method/effect combination is unique because since he is using just the number cards and the aces from a deck of cards he gets the benefit that the audience comes comes away thinking he memorized a full deck of playing cards.

Imo his method is much easier because he does not memorize any suits nor does he mentally convert the cards to a famous person, nor PA, nor PAO because it's not necessary since the card values suffice to make a two-digit number therefore, he has eliminated an extra step.

Also his rooms use an offset increment of 10. This makes it easy for him to do positional calculations. Note that most speed memorizers have a problem doing positional calculations.

Reminder that Kevin's technique with the 40 playing cards is used to demonstrate memory prowess similar to Harry Lorayne demonstrations and not to be used as a magic trick.

glowball Inner circle Nashville TN 1093 Posts	Posted: Oct 4, 2025 05:55 pm 1 How Kevin King demonstrates memorizing playing cards I got permission from Kevin King (Nashville, Tennessee memory expert and magician) to share his technique of memorizing a deck of shuffled cards and calling back the values as a demonstration of memory power. He normally only does this for a small group of people on an informal basis. How Kevin King demonstrates the memorization of a shuffled deck of 40 cards (the Court cards are not used, they are removed for his demonstration): For this demonstration he has a special memory palace with four rooms and each room has five Loci. He mentally has an offset number for each room: The first room offset is zero, the second room offset is 10, the third room offset is 20, and the fourth room offset is 30. Each two cards form a two-digit number. He equates that two-digit number to the object in his 00-99 permanent Major System list and mentally stores that object on the next available Loci in the room he's mentally in (starting with the first room). Note that the tens (10S, 10H, 10C, 10D), each are mentally encoded as a single zero. So for example let's say the shuffled deck of 40 cards are: 4D, 5C, 5H, 7C, AH, 7H, 2H, AC, 9H, 10S, 3C, 10H, 8C, 9D, 10C, 3D, 2C, 8S, 8H, 5S, 2S, 6C, 9S, 7S, 5D, 3H, 4S, 6D, 4H, AD, 9C, 7D, 6S, AS, 10D, 3S, 4C, 6H, 8D, 2D In room A (offset zero): 45 57 17 21 90 (Rail, Lock, Duck, Net, Bus) In room B (offset 10): 30 89 03 28 85 (Mice, VP, Swim, kNife, File) In room C (offset 20): 26 97 53 46 41 (Nacho, Pig, Llama, Roach, Rat) In room D (offset 30): 97 61 03 46 82 (Pig, Shoot, Swim, Roach, Fan) So in the example above in the first room (room A): the first piece of furniture would have a RAIL from a railroad track sticking up, the second piece of furniture would have a LOCK sitting in it, the third piece of furniture has a DUCK quacking, the fourth piece of furniture would have a fishing NET, and the last piece of furniture in that room would have a toy BUS. Also you could use a story to mentally link the five items in the room by saying: "A railroad RAIL is hitting a LOCK to try to free a DUCK caught in a NET and put on a school BUS so he won't be a quack". The call back to the audience: Since his words represent two digits which are based on the Major System he knows that RaiL (because of the R and L) means a four then a five. And so on. I tried to tell Kevin that he has a unique way of demonstrating card memorization, but he downplays any uniqueness saying his technique is no different than somebody memorizing a bunch of digits of pi which a lot of memory competitors use. But I do believe his overall method/effect combination is unique because since he is using just the number cards and the aces from a deck of cards he gets the benefit that the audience comes comes away thinking he memorized a full deck of playing cards. Imo his method is much easier because he does not memorize any suits nor does he mentally convert the cards to a famous person, nor PA, nor PAO because it's not necessary since the card values suffice to make a two-digit number therefore, he has eliminated an extra step. Also his rooms use an offset increment of 10. This makes it easy for him to do positional calculations. Note that most speed memorizers have a problem doing positional calculations. Reminder that Kevin's technique with the 40 playing cards is used to demonstrate memory prowess similar to Harry Lorayne demonstrations and not to be used as a magic trick.
glowball Inner circle Nashville TN 1093 Posts	Posted: Oct 4, 2025 06:01 pm 0 Kevin King two-digit numbers and associated thing (each thing is named based on the Major System): 00. Seesaw 01. Setter (Irish) 02. Sun 03. Swim 04. Sour (lemon) 05. Seal (animal) 06. Sushi 07. Sock 08. Safe (lock box) 09. Soap 10. Ties 11. Tot 12. Tan 13. Dummy 14. Tire 15. Tail 16. Tissue 17. Duck 18. Dove 19. Tape 20. Nose (clown) 21. Net 22. Nun 23. Enema 24. Nair 25. Nail 26. Nacho 27. Neck 28. Knife 29. Knob 30. Mice 31. Mud 32. Moon 33. Mummy 34. Mayor 35. Mule 36. Match 37. Mic 38. Movie 39. Mop 40. Rose 41. Rat 42. Rhino 43. Ram 44. Rare (steak) 45. Rail 46. Roach 47. Rake 48. Roof 49. Rope 50. Lice 51. Light 52. Lion 53. Llama 54. Lawyer 55. Lily (pod) 56. Leash 57. Lock 58. Lava 59. Lip 60. Cheese 61. Shoot or Cheetah 62. Chain 63. Chime 64. Shower 65. Jello 66. Judge 67. Jack 68. Chief 69. Sheep 70. Gas 71. Cat 72. Can 73. Gum 74. Car 75. Claw 76. Cage 77. Cake 78. Coffee 79. Cab 80. Vice 81. Foot 82. Fan 83. Foam 84. Fire 85. File (cabinet) 86. Fish 87. Fog (horn) 88. Fife (Barney) 89. VP (Vice President) 90. Bus 91. Bat 92. Piano 93. Bomb 94. Bear 95. Bell 96. Beach (ball) 97. Pig 98. BeehiVe 99. Pipe ------ Thanks Kevin!
Bobby Forbes Inner circle virginia beach, VA. 1591 Posts	Posted: Oct 7, 2025 12:10 am 0 It’s really fun. I’ve been doing this exact thing for the better part of 10 years or so. Really satisfying.
The Magic Cafe Forum Index » » Shuffled not Stirred » » How Kevin King demonstrates memorizing playing cards (1 Likes)