Ever wonder what happens to lottery winners? For instance, do they ever play again? And if so, do they ever win again?
For one Virginia Lottery player, winning big has become more than a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence.
Meet Norfolk’s Lucinda Britt.
This past May, Britt matched the four-digit combo in the nightly Virginia Lottery Pick 4 drawing by playing her birth year, 1-9-7-2.
Britt’s winning lottery strategy
Now, using your birth year when picking lottery numbers is a popular strategy. But Britt doubled way way down on her numbers.
The typical prize for hitting a Pick 4 drawing is $5,000 — on a single ticket, that is.
In Britt’s case, she purchased 41 separate tickets with that combination. She hit the number straight on 36 of the tickets, earning $5,000 each. On the remaining five tickets, she went 50/50, collecting $2,600 each.
She bought the tickets from two different spots in Norfolk, the Quick Stop Foods on Sewell’s Point Road and the Industrial Park BP on East Princess Anne Road.
In total, she earned a jaw-dropping $193,000 and says she plans to pay off her mortgage with the sum.
“I was shocked!” she said in a Virginia Lottery release. “I was so happy my leg was shaking.”
That first-time feeling
This was far from Britt’s first rendezvous with a win, however. Britt won an even bigger prize from the Virginia Lottery just six years ago.
In August of 2016, Britt and her friend Jennifer Molina split a $1 million prize off the Bank a Million game. That time, her six numbers were based on a combination of family birthdays.
Molina and Britt had been friends for 10 years, according to the Virginia Lottery release from 2016. The purpose of the Bank a Million game was that the winner received a million dollars after taxes had been removed.
Britt’s brother purchased the ticket at the Smoke Shack on Ballentine Blvd in Norfolk. They played 11-14-22-24-28-38 and matched all six numbers to win the prize.
Bank a Million is still offered by the Virginia Lottery with drawings on Wednesday and Saturday nights. The odds of winning the top prize are 1 in 3.8 million.
But the odds of winning a lottery game twice in six years?
Virginia Lottery funds education
The players aren’t the only ones taking home the big wins, though.
Virginia students are cashing in on a major victory as well.
Since its launch in 1987, the Virginia Lottery has generated more than $2 million per day for Virginia public school education efforts. According to its website, lottery customers produced more than $765 million in funding for education during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2021.
So, pay a visit to your nearest lottery retailer and support the Commonwealth.
And who knows — if you play it right, you might even end up winning twice.
