DARLINGTON -- Maryland resident Kathryn Cooley said her family always laughed when she entered any kind of sweepstakes.
"My family always teases me that I enter everything, but I had never won anything," she said.
They all stopped laughing when Nascar Sprint Cup Driver Jeff Burton showed up on her doorstep with the keys to a brand new Monte Carlo SS, painted to match Burton's No. 31 Prilosec OTC Car.
Burton also presented Cooley with tickets for four to 20 Sprint Cup races, VIP passes to go with each ticket, first class airline tickets to and from the races, accommodations while attending the races, a $700 traveling stipend for each race and a $20,000 cash prize.
"Everybody said, 'I didn't think anybody even won those prizes,'" she said. "Believe it or not, and I know some people don't, I really do use Prilosec."
It all began one day when she was clipping coupons for Prilosec and she saw the form to enter to win the grand prize.
Cooley said when she first received notification that she was a finalist for the grand prize, she took her documents to her local bank to be notarized, but the teller, a personal friend of Cooley's, refused to do it.
"She said 'This is identity theft, they're asking for your license, your Social Security number and she flatly refused to notarize them," Cooley said.
It took Proctor and Gamble calling the bank to confirm for the teller that the prize was in fact real and not a scam.
Cooley said the day Burton showed up on her doorstep was one she'll not soon forget.
"It was early in the morning," she said. "When I answered the door, instead of saying how nice it was for him to be there, I said 'You're supposed to be in Florida.'"
She said that was the first thing on her mind because she knew the time trials were going on that day in Florida.
"He was fascinated because it was cold and snowing," she said. "He was just a gentleman from the word go."
Cooley said within minutes of Burton's arrival, she was besieged by friends and family members coming from neighbor's houses where they had been hiding in anticipation of her winning the prize.
Although she had no clue the prize would be delivered that particular day, the organizers had called her children to confirm that she would be at home for the presentation.
For Cooley, it truly was the victory of a lifetime, since she had just completed a fight with breast cancer.
"I had the chemo(therapy) and the radiation," she said. "I went from being a brunette to (having gray hair). As of right now, everything is good and I'm just thankful.
"All of this has been just what the doctor ordered. My doctor told me to just go out there and live and stop worrying about the dollars and everything. Go out there and enjoy life. This has given us the chance to do that."
Cooley said she is getting ready to do a Relay for Life walk to support cancer research.
"It's a dream come true," she said. "We've always said we'd love to travel, but between raising a family and making a living, we never got a chance to."
Cooley, a 64-year-old mother of two and grandmother of four, said she wasn't even a fan of Burton's prior to the sweepstakes -- but she is now.
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