A couple of recent Virginia Lottery Pick 4 winners weren’t content with single winning tickets.
Instead, they used their same chosen numbers multiple times and won the grand prize with fistfuls of tickets.
In one case, a player used the same numbers to win the VA Lottery Pick 4 a staggering 25 times in one day. A few weeks later, another Pick 4 player accomplished the same feat and won 20 times during a single drawing.
That’s one way to earn a spot in lottery lore.
Pick 4 wins worth $5,000 each
The Pick 4 drawing is a standard offering from state lotteries, so it’s not often you hear of such an unusual story.
It’s even rarer to get them in consecutive months.
Raymond Harrington, from Virginia Beach, chose the numbers 4-6-4-0 to win the VA Lottery Pick 4 on July 17. In fact, he played the same numbers for all 25 winning tickets.
The Pick 4 grand prize is $5,000; therefore, Harrington earned a total of $125,000.
Not to be outdone, Tony Miles, a South Boston man who was in the Virginia town of Halifax, purchased 20 tickets on Aug. 22. He won all of them playing the Pick 4. That score, which came with numbers of 1-9-2-9, earned him $100,000.
Odds of winning Pick 4
The odds of winning the Pick 4 with an exact-order match are 1 in 10,000. Tickets are $1 each, so the $5,000 grand prize represents a meager 50% payout of the pot.
Still, the long Pick 4 odds didn’t deter the viral sensations.
Rather than choosing multiple number combinations, like many Pick 4 players do, they let it ride on a single set of digits.
As Harrington told VA Lottery officials:
“Something just told me to play 25 times.”
About the Virginia Lottery Pick 4
The Pick 4 is one of many draw games available through the Virginia Lottery. In-state draw games also include the Pick 3, Cash 5 and Bank A Million. Multi-state draw games include big jackpot options such as Mega Millions, Powerball and Cash4Life.
The VA Lottery has two Pick 4 draws per day.
Harrington and Miles played the customary exact-order Pick 4 option, so their numbers had to match precisely.
However, the VA Lottery also offers any order play options in which players can match the numbers in any sequence. Those payouts range from $200 to $1,200, depending on the chosen number combination.
Pick 4 players can also choose a 50/50 option. With that split ticket, players are wagering on both an exact-order match and an any-order match, with corresponding payouts.
Players can also opt for Combo Play and place a full $1 wager on each Pick 4 number combination of their chosen number. Pick 4 and other Virginia Lottery drawings stream on VALottery.com and its Facebook page. Many Virginia TV stations also air the draws live.
All Virginia Lottery revenue supports K-12 education in the commonwealth.
