In an unprecedented development, Mr David O'Donovan has won his third weekly Sharetrack 100 prize. His Phoenix portfolio was ablaze with the performances of Lucent Technologies (18.01 per cent gain) and America Online (8.44 per cent increase).

Although these wins were not part of his original strategy, Mr O'Donovan says since he is no longer in the running for the overall prize he is now concentrating on the weekly £1,000 cash award.

With only three weeks remaining in the Sharetrack 100 competition, definite strategies are emerging. The number one student this week, Mr David Butler, says "Keeping as much in one share as possible is the best way to win the weekly prize."

His Emmanuel Holdings portfolio clinched the top spot with a 12.6 per cent increase thanks to a big jump in the value of core stocks Amazon (up 18.53 per cent) and a marginal increase in Elan (up 0.58 per cent). He invested his tradable shares entirely in Amazon. To win the overall prize, Mr Butler believes players need a balanced portfolio.

At the moment, the overall student leaderboard is dominated by brother and sister Niall and Sarah Madden who share first place with their respective UN Headbanger and Corrib Village Asleep portfolios.

Both investment collections have core holdings in Lucent and Reuters (up 16.97 per cent) and are finely tuned by Cable and Wireless up 4.73 per cent during the week ending April 21st. Mr Madden disagrees with the weekly student winner's overall strategy and says: "For winning both the weekly and overall prizes you want to maximise risk with just a few shares and take a bet on which companies are going to do well."

An interest in the markets is hereditary for the Maddens and both started investing at a very young age. Niall says his first dabble in shares was financed with his Holy Communion money.

Today, he is a final year law and accounting student at University of Limerick while Sarah is just beginning her commerce studies at University College, Galway.

Previous overall leaders Mr Colm Martin and Mr Joe Twomey unseated usual top dog Mr Val McDermott from the pole position with their crisply named Tayto portfolio.

Nokia fell 16.28 per cent during the week ending April 14th, not 79.07 as reported last week. This error was due to the telecom company's recent four-to-one share split but the figures did not affect portfolio rankings.