Syndicate Lands A Christmas Win

A syndicate of ten lottery players – many of them colleagues at RAF St Morgan – won a Lotto jackpot worth £1,372,693 on 16 December 2006. The syndicate was started by Transport Controller Stephen Martin (who incidentally served in the Falklands War) when the UK National Lottery was launched in November 1994, and it is Stephen who buys the syndicate’s tickets each week.

Normally the syndicate tickets are purchased in plenty of time for the next draw, but for the 16 December draw Stephen inadvertently left things to the last minute. However, this may actually have helped him to recognise the fact that the syndicate might have won when he was watching the draw unfold on live television.

"I’d almost forgotten to get our tickets and had only gone online to buy them at around 5.30pm that evening," Stephen explained. "The numbers were fresh in my mind and when I heard the winning line it sounded familiar. My wife was in the kitchen making dinner so I told her I thought we had won and was going upstairs to check out our numbers on the computer. As you can imagine, she just didn’t believe me."

Stephen’s wife wasn’t the only person who had doubts. Like many winning players, Stephen had to check and double-check his numbers on Teletext to make sure that the syndicate really had been as lucky as he thought. "Even my wife had to believe me when I started ringing round our friends and family to tell them," Stephen said. "We even opened a bottle of champagne!"

The £1.37 million win was more than enough to give all of the syndicate members a Christmas to remember. Stephen commented that all of the members were "stunned but delighted" with the win, and said that not having to worry about the cost of Christmas was "an amazing feeling."

- 08/01/07