by Renee Israel
A couple, who described themselves a "ships in the night" due to their long
shift work hours, spoke of their absolute joy of winning the second largest
lottery prize in Britain's history.
Adrian and Gillian Bayford, both in their early forties, of Haverhill,
Suffolk, were left stunned when they learned that they were the winners of the
£148.6 million prize in this weekend's EuroMillions lottery draw.
The second hand record dealer and his wife, a children's ward healthcare
assistant who works long hours through the night, are still trying to take in
the news that they are now among the 1,000 richest people in the country.
This makes their daughter's question: "Do we have enough money to go to
Domino's Pizza for tea?" even more poignant.
Adrian Bayford has plans to continue his work and expand his business, but
his wife said that she was happily giving up her stressful job in order to spend
quality time with their children.
Couple Speak of Lottery Win
Although Camelot has known since the weekend about the identity of the
£148m EuroMillions winners, they were only introduced to the public
yesterday at a media conference held at the Down Hall Country House Hotel in
Hertfordshire.
The couple said that Gillian was trying to put the children to sleep when her
husband went upstairs to check the lottery numbers.
"Gradually the numbers seemed to match up with those on my ticket and I just
couldn't believe what I was seeing," recalled Adrian.
He said that in order to check the numbers again, he switched on the main
light, at which point, his wife went "ballistic" because she had just managed to
get the children down to sleep again.
"I was trying to tell her that we had won the lottery and she was telling me
to keep the noise down," he said.
Run of Luck for UK Lottery Players
The Bayfords are now the seventh EuroMillions winners from the United Kingdom
so far in 2012, with a total of £400 million paid out since January.
"We've had seven jackpot winners from the UK this year, which is
unprecedented. We have never seen anything like this," said a spokesman for the
National Lottery. "There's no rhyme or reason as to why we've been so lucky.
It's a lottery at the end of the day."
The Bayfords are a "few" million short of the £161 million won by Colin and
Chris Weir of Ayrshire last year.
