Canadians chasing dreams of financial freedom are pushing Lotto 6-49 sales up dramatically, inflating the $41-million top prize to a total that won’t be known until the dust has settled on Saturday night’s draw.

The estimated jackpot increases with the number of tickets sold. According to lottery officials, sales rose by 40 per cent between Wednesday night and Friday morning.

“Historically, $40 million seems to be that magic number and we do see a huge jump in sales whenever we get to a jackpot that’s this big,” said Sarah Kiriliuk of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp.

Normally sales increase by 23 per cent when the Wednesday jackpot rolls over to Saturday. With it already hitting $40 million, lottery officials said they don’t know how high it may climb before the terminals close at 9 p.m. Saturday.

The odds of winning are pegged at one chance in 14 million.

University of Toronto statistics professor Jeffrey Rosenthal gives people a jolt of reality when he puts that probability into perspective.

“If you see an adult woman chosen at random, the chance that she will give birth in the next minute and a half is about the same as the chance you’ll win the jackpot,” he said.

It would be four times more likely for a person chosen at random to become prime minister than for a ticket holder to win the big prize, adds Rosenthal, the author of Struck by Lightning: The Curious World of Probabilities.

If you're buying tickets in a group, the OLG warns people doing this to fill out a form provided on its website that catalogues all the buyers.

It can help avoid any controversy later if the group's numbers come up, Kiriliuk said.

The Canadian record for a Lotto 6-49 prize is $54.3 million won in 2005 by 17 people in Camrose, Alta.

Earlier this week, a 78-year-old man from Oakville, Ont., became Canada’s newest multimillionaire. Donald MacDonald struck it rich to the tune of $10 million in Friday’s Lotto Max draw and collected his cheque on Tuesday.

Last month, two tickets split a $50-million Lotto Max draw — one in Quebec and the other in British Columbia. Last November, Marie Fontaine of Pine Falls, Man., pocketed a $50-million Lotto Max prize.