Some longtime harness racing punters enjoy betting $2 to place on the favourite, knowing that a maximum return of $3 is the best they can hope for. But when any Canadian adult can walk into a lottery kiosk 365 days of the year and put up $2, with the hope of getting back millions, it can make that same place bet look a little dull to some. With racetracks across the country accessible to millions of people, TROT looks at a way where we can also offer them that ‘life-changing’ payout. The following is just a concept, but with a little work, this idea could come to life, across the country.

By Darryl Kaplan

You walk into your local harness racing establishment for an evening of racing. Whether it’s Northlands Park, Woodbine Racetrack or Northside Downs, tonight you can win $1 million. As you saunter in through the front entrance, a huge progressive number greets your eyes. This is the grand prize. You point to it and begin explaining it to your friends, who have never been to the races.

In order to win this jackpot, you don’t need to bet races taking place half a world away, and you don’t need to watch a simulcast screen to win. This bet involves seven races taking place tonight, live and in front of you.

“Oh Canada,” the country’s first national horse racing jackpot, consists of a central pool shared from coast to coast. Canadian tracks can participate as long as they follow the “Oh Canada” rules. The wager has a $1 base bet and asks players to choose the winners of seven consecutive designated races, but doesn’t require the customer to hit all seven races to win a shot at the jackpot. In fact, with just four winners, you could capture the big prize.

There were several goals when developing “Oh Canada.”

• The bet needed to focus on the live product to drive handle at tracks that traditionally have limited betting.

• It needed to keep people engaged throughout the card, to combat tracks emptying out part way through the evening.

• It needed to have a pool big enough to excite newcomers walking in the front door, and allow them to bet despite limited knowledge of the product.

• The bet had to cater to racetrack regulars who felt the nightly payout is enough of a prize to keep supporting the bet.

Here’s how it works. Customers select horses in the seven races of the evening. Each race must have at least eight horses in to go, and not be scratched down to below six horses.

If a person is a racetrack veteran, they can handicap the races, structure their ticket, and attempt to pick the winners. For a newcomer, they may choose the “Crazy Canada” option which is an educated quick pick, allowing them to choose how much they’d like to bet and how risky they want their ticket to be. The computer generated system will rely on early money bet, and the morning line, to give the “Crazy Canada” customer a fighting chance.

Along with each ticket a person bets, comes a randomly selected nine digit number.

At the conclusion of the seven race sequence, a regular payout (from 60% of the amount bet) is produced for the person, or people, with the most winners. But also, for everyone who chose four or more winners, the customer wins a chance at the constantly growing jackpot. For four winners chosen, you’ll need to hit all nine randomly drawn numbers to capture the jackpot; for five winners, you’ll need to hit the last eight digits: for six correct – the last seven numbers; and for seven correct, you’ll need to match the last six numbers.

Yes, the chances of winning what should eventually grow to a multi-million dollar prize will be very slim. And yes, one would need to correctly select multiple horse winners, and then hit a tough random draw to win. But on the positive side, the size of the jackpot pool each night will make the “Oh Canada Pick 7” worth playing. And when it comes to the odds of hitting big payouts, consider that the probability of hitting the Lotto 6/49 top prize is 1 in 14.0 million for a $3 base bet, Lotto Max is 1 in 28.6 million for a $5 base bet and the Megabucks progressive slot machine jackpot has a 1 in 49.8 million chance of winning.

This concept of having winners receive a chance at a jackpot pool based on a random number is the same method used by the Quinte+ wager in France. And despite the Quinte+ only taking place once each night, the bet generates more than 20% of pari-mutuel wagering in the country.

The “Oh Canada” wager will rely on a central pool that grows by adding 23% of every dollar bet, to the pool (the remaining 17% is retained for administration and track takeout). While there are some complicated details, such as what happens when your ticket wins multiple chances at the jackpot, there are computer generated solutions to the problem, giving certain combinations more chances at hitting the jackpot.

While larger tracks across North America have implemented bets like Woodbine’s Jackpot Hi 5 and Gulfstream Park’s Rainbow Six, such wagers rely on volume that small tracks are likely not able to replicate. Those bets only pay the entire jackpot when one single ticketholder picks the winning combination.

With the “Oh Canada” concept, if wagering is low, the jackpot will slowly grow, but it is absolutely critical that the industry establish significant seed money to ensure that when the jackpot is won, that it starts back up at $1 million (like the Megabucks slot machine, which resets to $1 million).

By developing a country-wide brand, it also allows for a centralized marketing and promotional strategy -– something that must be funded by utilizing dedicated administration funds.

A major multi-million dollar jackpot pool, available on every race night, at every track in the country, has the potential to be a significant game changer for harness racing, especially in racing’s smaller and more rural communities. The bet doesn’t require huge pools, and is the perfect wager to eventually expand into convenience stores, and neighbourhood betting outlets.

As for when a concept like “Oh Canada” can be implemented, with agreement and participation, the technical obstacles are not too great. The bet would operate through existing tote machines and use technology that already is well established.

Now that that’s settled, what are we waiting for?