Just as it did two weekends ago, Del Mar will offer a “Pick Six Weekend” to its fans for the upcoming Saturday and Sunday when the track will have 10-race cards with 2 p.m. first posts on both afternoons.
Saturday’s program will have a “$1-million guarantee” offer, meaning anyone correctly selecting the six horses as a single-ticket winner would get the day’s prize (say possibly $400,000), then receive an additional check from Del Mar to raise their earnings to $1 million. If there is no single ticket winner that day, all carryover monies go forward to Sunday.
Then Sunday’s ‘mandatory’ day will be presented offering an assured payout on the bet to those with the most winners that afternoon – be it six, five or whatever – where the final pot is divided by the total number of winners. There will be no carryovers on that card.
Going into Thursday’s card at Del Mar, the present Pick Six carryover amounts to $225,350. There are eight races scheduled that afternoon and another eight on Friday prior to “Pick Six Weekend.” If the bet is not “hit” over the upcoming three afternoons, a potential final pool in the $3-million range is quite possible. When Del Mar presented a similar scenario two weekends back, the final Pick Six pool rose to $3,057,176.
The Pick Six may be wagered on for as little as .20¢. Normally, it pays out 70% of its total pool to those with the most winners with the remaining 30% being carried forward to the following day’s race program.
The largest win prize in the history of the bet at Del Mar took place on August 1, 2004 when one bettor collected a reward of $2,100,017.