Kilbeggan mum wins €44k on winning streak

Photo shows, Ita Brennan, second from left, with Marty Whelan Winning Streak game show co-host; Maebh Gleeson, National Lottery and Sinead Kennedy Winning Streak Game Show co-host.

It appears that Kilbeggan may be Ireland's luckiest town, after a mum of three from the town won €44,000 on this weekend's Winning Streak on RTE 1 - the second local woman to win big on the show in the space of three weeks.

It was a dream come true for Ita Brennan, who won €20,000 by spinning the Winning Streak Grand Prize wheel, to add to the €24,000 in cash she had already won from the night.

Ita missed her name getting called out the week before as she was having dinner and chatting with her husband Tony, her daughter Amy and son-in-law, Michael. The show was on the television but it was muted as the family were deep in discussion

Her phone rang a minute later as her sister called her to say her name was pulled out on Winning Streak. With that Ita grabbed the remote and rewound the show back a couple of minutes and was able to witness it her good news. The family had a great celebration for the rest of the evening.

Ita is Kilbeggan born and bred and is the second Winning Streak player from the Westmeath town during this current series of the show after Michelle Connolly won €40,000 three weeks ago. She has been married to Tony for 36 years and the couple have three children.

Tony, Amy and a number of other family and friends cheered Ita on from the audience while her daughter Hazes watched from home. Ita’s other son, Noel, watched online from his home in Sydney, Australia.

Ita works as a sales assistant at the Castle Gift shop in Athlone town, where she has worked for the past five years. In her spare time Ita loves singing and music and sings in two choirs: the Kilbeggan choir and Cantoiri Tullamore, where she rehearses every Tuesday. She says the choirs are ramping up practice as they are coming into the busy festive period.

With her winnings from the show Ita really wants to upgrade her car. She says her current Peugeot 206 is on its last legs and prays every day that it will get her to and from work.

The National Lottery game show is co-presented by Marty Whelan and Sinead Kennedy and features some perennial favorite games including Play or Pay, Roll for Riches, WinFall and Electric Dream – where one player will win an electric car worth €25,000.