ALTOONA, IA – With ten days left in the thoroughbred meet at Prairie Meadows, the jackpot pick five carryover has reached a record $318,337.  The wager requires a single unique winning ticket picking the winner of the last five races on the card in order for the jackpot to be won.

The jackpot was last paid out on May 26 when none of the five post time favorites won during the final five races that afternoon. The jackpot totaled $8,781.80. The largest Jackpot Pick 5 win of the 2018 Thoroughbred season equaled $29,418.10. It was hit on May 13, when the highest win mutual in the five-race sequence was $23.20.

The Jackpot Pick 5 format debuted at Prairie Meadows last season. During that year, the jackpot paid out six figures twice. It was hit at $108,624.25 on June 1 and $101,779.95 on July 29.

With the unique, single ticket format, the jackpot wager has come under fire from serious bettors because of the wager’s high effective takeout.  Because the pool can only be won by a single unique ticket, the effective takeout on the wager moves from the advertised 15% to around 50% on non-jackpot winning days. However, the “jackpot” wager has been spreading steadily across the country offering bettors the possibility of a life changing score off of a relatively small wager (fifty cents at Prairie Meadows, as low as twenty cents at other tracks).  After Gulfstream Park showed success with the wager in 2011, over a dozen racetracks in North America now offer some form of the ‘jackpot’ wager.

If the jackpot is not won before Saturday, August 11 there will be a mandatory payout on the last day of the thoroughbred meet, Iowa Classic Day, when the pool will be paid out among all patrons that have correctly chosen all five winners.