One lucky man has one the lottery three times – twice just this year.
You have a one in 14million chance of winning Canada’s Lotto 6/49 jackpot, but David Serkin, from Lethbridge, Alberta, has done that thrice.
He had to wait 12 years between his first prize of $250,000 and the second – $500,000 – earlier this year.
But it wouldn’t be long until he won again in the latest $1,000,00 draw, much to the surprise of his wife and friends.
‘They all asked how I’d managed to win’, he said. ‘They were ribbing me last time, and they’re ribbing me even more now.’
Mr Serkin is planning to whisk his wife off on a holiday to Maui, Hawaii, where they spent their honeymoon.
They are also planning trips to Newfoundland and Labrador, in the east of Canada, and Yellowstone National Park in the US.
‘You’ve got to keep your wife happy, and I’ve been doing it for decades’, he said.
Mr Serkin’s managed triple feat with the simple trick of buying a Quick Pick ticket for every draw.
Still, he said ‘it’s just unbelievable.. it feels good, it always feels good’ But there are few in the world who can say that from personal experience.
Only a handful of people have ever won more than once in the UK.
David and Kathleen Long won £1million in July 2013, following by another £1million, and a Jaguar car in the EuroMillions Mega Friday in March 2015.
‘I was passing the local shop and saw there were ten £1 million prizes on EuroMillions and a nice car and thought yeah I’ll give that a go’, David said.
A Lotto spokesperson said: ‘This is an extraordinary situation where somebody’s been fortunate enough to win twice.
‘As you can imagine, we see winners who win once who are very, very shocked. It must be even more shocking to win twice.’
George Traykov picked up a £160,873 EuroMillions prize in 2013, adding to the £1million he won in the Millionaire Raffle in September 2011. He was one digit off claiming £12million.
In another spell of good luck, cleaner Gayle Say accidentally became a millionaire after winning the same lottery draw twice.
The Coventry grandmother didn’t mean to buy two tickets with identical numbers in a 2019 Thunderbal, but she was delighted when her mistake earned her two prizes of £500,000.
Others have won multiple times on a smaller scale. Lancashire couple Neil and Hayley, from Darwin, won the People’s Postcode Lottery twice in three weeks, earning them more than £30,000.
‘We just bought the house three months ago’, Neil said at the time. ‘We started playing as soon as we moved in’
Some have drawn suspicion because they have won so many times.
Amelia Barnham, a 69-year-old from Hammersmith, London, was investigated earlier this year after winning a total of £23,600 in small prizes over the years.
While waiting for her £800 winnings from her £1 HotPicks, Ms Barnahm was visited by an investigator from Lotto operator Allwyn.
She said: ‘He said it was because of the amount of wins that I had won and hopefully I should hear back within a week but I’m still waiting.
‘I think it’s disgusting and disgraceful the way I’ve been treated and the way I’m sure many others have been treated.
‘I will never ever buy tickets again — not if I’m going to have this sort of trouble getting winnings which are owed to me.’
Allwyn released a statement saying the security check is ‘a new claims process following the Post Office’s decision to no longer pay National Lottery retail prizes between £500.01 and £50,000’.
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