Mystery Voucher Goes Uncashed, Top Prize Worth $2 Mil

A Muncie, Ind., woman received the $1.75 million mutuel ticket in the National Thoroughbred Racing Association's mystery voucher promotion. Unfortunately, she didn't redeem it.

The woman, who was not identified, received the ticket because she was on Hoosier Park's mailing list and the racetrack participated in the promotion. She reportedly lives about 20 miles from the track. Each grand prize voucher is sent out randomly. The NTRA does not know where the voucher was mailed until it is redeemed or the promotion ends.

"This year the promotion happened to coincide with our opening," said Kris Thompson Johns, Hoosier Park's vice president of marketing. "The promotion helped us generate a large crowd, unfortunately the big voucher was not redeemed."

The NTRA has yet to pay out the big prize for its mystery mutuel voucher program, which began in August 2000. Because the grand prize went unclaimed, the prize will be increased by $250,000 to $2 million for the next promotion to be held Aug. 3 on the day of the Whitney Handicap (gr. I).