An unemployed Johannesburg-based racing fan enjoyed the most memorable Mother’s Day of his life when he found all eight winners on the Turffontein Sunday card to scoop the R720 000 all-or-nothing Hollywoodbets Punters’ Challenge jackpot.
The 26-year-old Isaiah Samuels, who competes under the banner of Zai97, has been playing the free-to-enter competition for some two years now and told the Sporting Post that his prayers ‘had literally been answered’.
“Our Grandmother passed two years ago. She was the mainstay of our family and Mother’s Day brings plenty of sadness. But I think she is smiling down on me after this life-changing windfall,” said the man who can’t find a job, has bills to pay, and smooth tyres on his car.
Isaiah can thank Denis Schwarz for three terrific winning rides on the afternoon.
Schwarz replaced Gavin Lerena in the final race on Global Impact and basically rode his colleagues to sleep.
“I am speechless. I got up at 03h00 on Sunday morning and studied the form and went through the card. I have been following the Matchett stable so went with Global Impact in the last. I was worried about the riderless horse – and Keagan de Melo was flying on Millahue. I think I aged another 26 years! But all’s well that ends well. I can go and get my tyres on Monday. It has to be a good year I think,” he joked.
The Hollywoodbets Punters’ Challenge requires you to select a horse in each race of the designated local race meeting, as well as the Hong Kong and Singapore race meetings.
The new Hollywoodbets Punters’ Challenge prize payouts formula means that besides the R5 000 daily must-be-won prize, which is allocated to the top 20 finishers on the leaderboard for every challenge race meeting, the all-or-nothing 100% clean sheet jackpot prize is determined by the number of runners at the race meeting, multiplied by R10 000 per unit, for all venues.
