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Tuesday night’s Lotto Max jackpot is a potentially life-changing $70 million, the largest possible single payout available in Canada. Here are five things to know about the big July 23 draw.
Is this a record jackpot?
Sort of. Lotto Max, um, maxes out with a jackpot of $70 million for any one draw, building from a base amount of $10 million until it is matched with a winning ticket. Anything in the prize pool above that is paid out as individual $1 million prizes known as Maxmillions.
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B.C. Lottery Corp., or BCLC for short — which oversees the draw in the province, although the lottery is available countrywide — says 10 Maxmillion prizes are available Tuesday, making the potential payout in top prizes $80 million.
But in June 2021, the jackpot was $70 million and there were an unprecedented 70 Maxmillions available, the largest potential payout in Canadian lotto history at $140 million.
Who won that big prize?
That June 22, 2021, draw saw the $70 million split between two winners, one of whom was in B.C. Gary Hill, a retired Kamloops truck driver, snagged $35 million while the other winner was in Alberta.
Thirty of the 70 available Maxmillions were also paid out, for a total of $100 million in top prizes that day.
What’s the biggest jackpot won in B. C.?
Later in 2021, Christine Lauzon of Burnaby took home what stands as the largest single jackpot in B.C. history when she won $70 million in a Lotto Max draw.
Other big recent winners are Hao Ping Chung of Richmond, who set a record for a ticket bought online at Playnow.com with a $58 million win in the Lotto 6/49 draw this March. Scott Gurney, a Sidney bookkeeper, picked up $55 million in a Lotto Max draw last year — the biggest prize ever awarded on Vancouver Island.
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The record jackpot will always be Lotto Max when it’s at its maximum, because Lotto 6/49 was revamped two years ago to make the highest “gold ball” payout slightly less, $68 million.
Has a huge jackpot ever gone unclaimed?
Oh my, yes. A $70 million Lotto Max jackpot that matched a ticket bought in Scarborough, Ont. for a draw in June 2022 was never claimed.
Winners have exactly a year to come forward or the huge pile of cash gets returned to the lottery prize pool. That’s what happened two years ago when thousands of people tried to claim they’d lost a ticket but none was deemed a winner.
In 2022, a $15 million Lotto Max prize matching a ticket bought in Vancouver went unclaimed.
How much does a big jackpot increase sales?
BCLC says a higher than normal Lotto Max jackpot drives a jump in ticket sales. When the top prize is above the median jackpot, sales in B.C. increase by about 35 to 40 per cent, though the exact amount of increased interest varies from draw to draw.
Worth a shot, right? Just keep in mind, no matter how big the jackpot gets, your odds of winning don’t get any higher. For the Lotto Max, your chance of winning the jackpot, whatever its amount, is estimated at one in 33,294,800.
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jruttle@postmedia.com
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