A Chinese pro who had barely played the game just dismantled one of the toughest final tables of the summer. Dong Chen won Event #38, the $10,000 Limit Hold’em Championship at the 2026 World Series of Poker, taking home $285,200 and the second gold bracelet of his career — in only the second Limit Hold’em tournament he has ever entered.
Chen outlasted a 121-entry field worth $1,125,300, then beat Britain’s Benny Glaser heads-up to close it out. The runner-up finish ($190,260) denied Glaser a ninth bracelet. For Chen, it was proof that his aggressive instincts carry across formats.
His second Limit Hold’em event, ever
Here is the detail that makes this one land differently: Chen’s first taste of tournament Limit Hold’em came only days earlier, when he min-cashed in 52nd place in a $1,500 event. This was tournament number two.
“Poker-wise, this wasn’t my first rodeo. I’ve battled with legends in No-Limit Hold’em,” Chen said through a translator. “But Limit Hold’em is something new that I just recently unlocked, so it feels really good.” Short-stacked and three-handed against Glaser and Jeremy Ausmus — a pair who own 14 bracelets between them — he leaned on relentless three- and four-betting. “That’s my default, go-to strategy.”
A murderers’ row stood in his way
The seven-handed final table read like a who’s-who. Glaser came in as chip leader off three bracelets last year. Ausmus was hunting his seventh. Jesse Lonis was chasing a third. And Gus Hansen, one of the faces of the poker boom, was sitting at his first WSOP final table since 2011 before busting in sixth.
Chen swung between the short stack and the lead repeatedly before pulling away. He sent Ausmus out in third when a turned flush left the Hall-of-Famer drawing dead. The final hand was pure Limit Hold’em cruelty for Glaser: he got his chips in with ten-eight, flopped a pair, turned two pair — and watched Chen’s ace-four spike a river flush to seal the bracelet.
Rare company for a Chinese champion
The win makes Chen just the third player from China to capture multiple WSOP bracelets, joining Xixiang Luo and Renji Mao. His first came in the $10,000 6-Handed High Roller at the 2023 WSOP Paradise, and he now sits north of $4.1 million in live earnings. He credited the support back home for pushing him over the line: “When I bagged for Day 2, everyone in the Chinese poker community was rooting for me. So pursuing more bracelets is one of my poker goals.”
There was a lighter footnote, too. Daniel Negreanu — who drafted Chen for $4 in this year’s WSOP fantasy after rivals had him at $1 — was among the first to rush over and celebrate. Asked what he is worth now, Chen grinned: “Between $5 and $7.” With Limit Hold’em events still left on the schedule, China’s newest two-time bracelet winner has no intention of stopping at one new trick.