By Todd Northrop
New Year's Eve might be a lucky night for Lotto Max players across Canada.
Since no winning tickets were sold for the $50 million jackpot in last week's Christmas Eve draw, lottery players are getting another chance tonight at the $50 million jackpot, with an additional estimated 18 MaxMillions $1 million prizes.
"Talk about starting 2011 off with a bang! This would be a great way to begin the New Year for Lotto Max players because there are lots of additional $1 million prizes up for grabs, on top of the big jackpot," said Wendy Montgomery, Vice President of Lottery Marketing and Sales for the Ontario Lottery.
When a Lotto Max jackpot reaches $50 million, instead of the main jackpot continuing to grow, MaxMillions bonus draws are added — an additional $1 million MaxMillions bonus draw for each $1 million that would traditionally be added to the jackpot.
For tonight's New Year's Eve drawing, the Canadian lotteries are estimating that 18 MaxMillions bonus draws will be conducted, in addition to the $50 million main jackpot drawing. The actual number of MaxMillions bonus draws will depend on the exact number of tickets sold prior to the close of ticket sales tonight.
If multiple tickets match a MaxMillions bonus draw numbers, the matching tickets will split the $1 million prize.
If no ticket matches the numbers drawn for the main jackpot drawing, the $50 million jackpot will carry-over into next week's drawing, and even more MaxMillions bonus draws will be added.
All of the drawing results — including both the main jackpot draw and the MaxMillions draws — are published on Lottery Post's Canada Multi-Province Lottery Results page, as well as on each of the individual Canada lottery results pages (Atlantic, British Columbia, Ontario, Québec, and Western Canada).
Lotto Max tickets cost $5. Each ticket contains three sets of seven numbers ranging from 1 to 49. Players can either choose their own numbers or have the computer pick random numbers for the first set of numbers, and the second two sets of numbers are selected randomly by the lottery terminal.
I am part of a number of groups playing Lotto Max. We have a total of 254 tickets for tonight's draw. Looking forward to starting the new year on the positive side.
Good luck.
let me guess..i'll say 4 prizes of 20 and 26 free plays out of those tickets.
We are hoping for much more. A MaxMillions prize of $1 million would be nice but of course, the jackpot is what we are aiming for.
Good luck.
North America is rocking with some great jackpots. Best wishes players.
so what province hit the lottomax?
your comment made me crack up because it is so true. i get the multi draw tickets and i check them when i can get back up there to check them. so far i always hit the free ticket and a single win of twenty dollars. i had one multi ticket that i won 5 free tickets on and those 5 free tickets got me 2 more free tickets. it would be nice to win into the hundreds or thousands.
right now i have 2 multi tickets and one expiring next month and i will drive up from washington to see what i won. there are just too many numbers to check to make me want to sit down and do it at the ontairio site. the computer is so much nicer and easier.
the last thing is that i met a couple of canadians here in the states and they didn't know they could buy a ticket for the mega million jackpot. i told them they should buy a ticket on their way back to BC because i buy lottomax and 6/49 tickets in BC all the time. no one won so i won't see a couple hundred dollars for a thank you.
so what did yous end up winning.
$40 and 37 free tickets.
ontario....always ontario or quebec.
Not true. The previous jackpot was won in British Columbia.
Good luck.
ok than...the majority of jackpots are won in ontario and quebec.
a group of people who won the 50 million work at a bell canada call centre. the prize is on hold as a few more have come out of the woodwork claiming they should get a piece of the pie. so what happened?
they were tired of throwing in 5$ so they dropped out?
the organizer forgot to ask them for cash? highly unlikely.
it all boils down to GREED!! if they never signed a document than they shouldn't get anything. nice way to cause dissension in the workplace. hope the people who won don't even buy them donuts if it's proven that the whiners have no leg to stand on.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/916420--olg-begins-interviews-to-sort-claims-to-lotto-max-jackpot