An Armidale father has discovered a lottery win can come with unexpected side effects after his $1.6 million Saturday Lotto division one win left him wide awake, frantically googling.
The Northern Tablelands resident held one of the four division one winning entries nationally in the Saturday Lotto draw 4599, drawn Saturday 16 August 2025. Each division one winning entry scored $1,631,770.49.
In addition to division one, the dotting dad scored division three 24 times, division four 90 times, and division six 80 times, boosting his total lottery loot to $1,656,468.39.
When we spoke to the winning man, he shared he'd barely slept a wink since checking his ticket.
"Oh my god. I can't say I've had much sleep! After checking it, I was tossing and turning all night," he said.
"It's all a bit surreal. When I checked my ticket on my online account, my first reaction was 'Holy dooly!'. It was crazy to see right in front of me.
"A thousand thoughts started going through my mind. I was wondering whether it was real or not, and what I needed to do now. It was very hard to stay calm.
"I'm kind of a boring guy. Straight away, I started thinking of how I can be most sensible with it, and of course, I'm googling every question that pops into my head while I'm at it.
"We'll keep it real and take our time. I think paying off the home loan will be the first order of business, and I'll be treating the family to a holiday.
"It's amazing. I'm just stoked. Thank you so much."
His winning marked System 10 entry was purchased via The Lott app - the official home of Australia's lotteries.
