Chase the Ace jackpot reaches $502K in The Pas

Someone is due for a massive pay day when a Chase the Ace game in The Pas that has lasted more than a year finally reaches its conclusion.

The pot has grown from $65,000 on Jan. 7, 2017, when this current round of the game started, to more than $500,000.

"It was a real slow start, but once it hit about $200,000 it just started climbing really quickly," said Linda Kuhl, manager of Royal Canadian Legion Branch 19 in The Pas, which hosts the weekly contest.

Every week, people pack the legion, which only holds about 200 people, but Kuhl says everyone buys tickets for friends and relatives who can't make it inside.

The rules are simple: every week the legion draws one ticket. Whoever has that ticket gets to come up and pick a card from a deck of cards, with the hope of drawing the Ace of Hearts.

If that person doesn't draw the ace of hearts, they get 15 per cent of the sales proceeds from that week, and 50 per cent of the proceeds are rolled over into the next week's pot.

The rest is donated to non-profits in The Pas. So far this round the Chase the Ace contest has raised $90,000 for local non-profits.

The game is only supposed to last for 54 weeks, but the contest took a break in December due to other bookings at the legion. With nine cards left, the jackpot has now reached $502,309.

Kuhl says she doesn't know why it's taken so long for someone to find the ace.

"Honest I don't have it up my sleeve," she said. "We've had inspectors here now for three weeks in a row watching us, because it is high and we don't want people to think that there's a reason why that ace isn't being found."

Kuhl was getting so tired of playing Chase the Ace week in week out that she joked she was going to "mark that damn ace so they would find it."

But she doesn't mind the extra money the game has brought in to the legion. At a time when other legions are closing due to lack of business the legion in The Pas has been able to replace its roof, and plans to renovate the bar.

Once someone does win the prize, Kuhl says they will take a break before starting the next game.