Written by Bill Rea
Many people get new cars as graduation presents, but Cheltenham resident Chris Sumsion won his.
Sumsion, 21, picked up the keys to a brand new 2016 Cadillac XTS as the first grand prize winner in the Ontario Lottery and Gaming (OLG) Full Throttle Promotion. This was a couple of days before he collected his college diploma.
“It’s the best graduation gift, by far!” he declared after learning he had won. “It came as a huge surprise to me, my mom and my entire family! No one I know ever wins anything.”
That was followed by an email, confirming he had won.
“That’s when I knew it was real,” he said. “My entire family is so excited for me. They will all get a ride. But my first passenger will be my mom.”
Sumsion and his mother Julie Cox share a very special bond.
“The day I was born, my mom couldn’t get to the hospital in time so the paramedics raced to our home and I was born on the kitchen floor,” he explained. “A week later, those same paramedics returned to check on us. They explained how they rarely deal with good news, so this call was extra special to them. That story has been told to me many times over the years. In June, I graduated from college as a Paramedic, inspired by the help that was offered to me and my family.”
“I went to the PlayOLG website to buy lottery tickets and play a few slot games,” Sumsion said. “That’s when I saw the Full Throttle Promotion. I decided to go for it. Everyone wants to win a car and the grand prize was valued at $85,000! But when the call came from OLG that I won, I couldn’t believe it.”
The Full Throttle contest ran from March 1 to April 30.
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