I won £200,000 Lamborghini on £3 Spot the Ball
Nov 2019
IT is a sleek and stylish supercar with a top speed of 200mph and a price tag of £200,000.
So when Scots oil and gas worker Chris Phillips entered a contest to try to win a coveted Lamborghini Huracan Evo, he never expected to take home the dream car.
But the former firefighter’s £2.75 stake on the Spot the Ball competition paid off – and he picked up the vehicle and £20,000 in cash.
Mr Phillips – originally from Aberdeen but now living in Spain – also got to put the Lamborghini through its paces on the famous Goodwood Motor Circuit.
The 41-year-old said: ‘I got the call to say I had won and I was wobbly-legged... it really is a dream car.’
Mr Phillips was the 500th winner of the Best of the Best (BOTB) competition. Petrol heads can enter the online draw to win a car by choosing where they think the missing ball should be on a sporting picture.
After being told he had scooped a unknown supercar prize, Mr Phillips was flown from his home in Jerez, in southern Spain, to London, where he spent a night in a hotel before being taken by helicopter to claim his motor at Goodwood, West Sussex.
He said: ‘I didn’t know which supercar I had won at that point. I was pacing up and down in the hotel room with excitement. When we got in the helicopter we were flown over the Top Gear racetrack before we reached Goodwood.’
At the circuit, his prize was hidden under a sheet. But Mr Phillips said: ‘Lamborghinis have a very distinctive shape, I could see it under the covers. I’ve loved Italian race cars for years and this is basically an F1 car turned into a road car.
‘It’s classy. You can smell the leather interior and it’s surprisingly comfortable, too, despite being so close to the ground.
‘What an experience it was taking that car around Goodwood – it’s a wee bit different from driving around in an 18-ton fire engine.’
Mr Phillips, who was a firefighter in Perth before changing careers, has lived in Spain for the past two years with his partner Elena.
He said: ‘You really can’t live in a better place to drive than Jerez. I might take the car right along the Spanish coast, up to Monaco and across the French Riviera through to Italy, where my brother lives. As for the £20,000, I haven’t started to look at what upgrades there are yet but this is a once-in- a-lifetime opportunity to do that and have the ultimate car.’
BOTB has given away cars worth more than £20million in weekly contests since it was founded in 1999. Its judges include former England footballer Sol Campbell.
