Amateur Skye Chen Wins WSOP Ladies Championship on Her First Tournament Try

A software engineer who recently walked away from her tech career to travel and play poker, Skye Chen has won the 2026 WSOP Event #68: $1,000 Ladies No-Limit Hold'em Championship — outlasting 1,475 entries for $194,630 in what was, remarkably, her very first poker tournament.

From a Mahjong trip to a WSOP title

Chen's road to the winner's circle was anything but conventional. She had accompanied friends to Las Vegas for a Mahjong tournament and decided, more or less on a whim, to enter a WSOP event instead. Over the past couple of years she had played almost exclusively cash games, gradually climbing from $1/$3 stakes to $5/$10 — but had never sat down for a tournament until this one.

That inexperience never showed. Chen began the final day in second chip position, trailing Emily Spencer, who held roughly twice her stack. Rather than force the action, she picked her spots and steadily rebuilt, before a rivered flush against Spencer handed her the chip lead. She went on to eliminate Spencer to stretch her advantage over the rest of the table.

Lead changes and a timely double

The momentum was far from one-way. Lisa Teebagy surged after busting Caitlin Comeskey in fourth, then took a big pot off Chen with turned trips against Chen's pair. Three-handed, Teebagy held the lead and Chen was the short stack — until Chen found a crucial double from the small blind with ace-jack to climb back into it.

Aubrey Williams briefly seized control, building to nearly 60 percent of the chips in play after calling with king-jack against Chen's ace-king. The lead swapped hands repeatedly before Chen eliminated Teebagy with pocket fives that turned a set, setting up heads-up play.

The hero call that decided it

Chen entered the heads-up duel facing a 3:5 chip deficit. The defining moment came when she made what she called a hero call, correctly reading Williams' bluff to take a pivotal pot and grab the lead.

"The sizing just seemed like it was meant to intimidate me. If I'm going to take a 50-50 to try to win the tournament right here, this is going to be the moment."

Williams refused to go quietly, doubling up three times, but could not close the gap. The final hand saw her unable to improve against Chen's pocket fours, and when no ace arrived on the board, Chen had her title.

Just the beginning

Chen was visibly surprised to have won on her first attempt, crediting the same single-mindedness that powered her tech career.

"I'm the kind of person where if I really wanted to do something, I can put a lot of time and effort, and I can grind it, and I can learn it really fast."

She framed the bracelet not as a finish line but a starting point, planning to celebrate over dinner with her Vegas Dragons club friends before deciding what comes next at the tables.