WSOP Player of the Week: Yanting Jiang

Yanting Jiang is the real sensation of the 2026 World Series of Poker finale. To her unexpected victory in a major tournament she has now added first place in our vote for the title of WSOP Player of the Week. Subscribers of the Pokerflow Telegram channel cast more votes for the American player than for legendary Russian cash game player Alexander Kostritsyn and even than for Phil Hellmuth himself. It's time to get to know our heroine a little better.

A non-champion background

Little is known about Yanting Jiang. She is an amateur from Indianapolis who mainly plays cash games. That said, the American is certainly not one of those high-profile cash game players who regularly show up on streams. Jiang is a single mother raising two children, so for her poker is more of a hobby that brings in some extra income.

Jiang plays live tournaments extremely rarely. Before the biggest score of her career, the American ranked somewhere in the five hundreds of Indiana's all-time live earnings list. She made her World Series debut in 2022 and immediately finished in the money twice. Admittedly, those were fairly modest cashes. The player earned $840 in the $400 COLOSSUS and $1,602 in the Mini Main Event with a $1,000 buy-in.

The following year Yanting Jiang managed to reach the ITM only once, but she took home a sum 12 times the tournament buy-in. The amateur made it to 17th place in the $600 No-Limit Hold'em/Pot-Limit Omaha 8-Handed event and earned $7,498. After skipping the WSOP in 2024, Jiang returned to the series last year and again recorded two modest cashes. She spent $600 on buy-ins to the PLO Deepstack 8-Handed and the NLH/PLO Deepstack 8-Handed, winning a combined $2,760 in them. 

It was with such a non-champion background that Yanting Jiang came to WSOP 2026. But it was this very festival in Las Vegas that proved to be her breakthrough. At the end of June the player set a new best cash, earning $24,650 for 47th place in Mystery Millions. Jiang's incredible success was then just a couple of weeks away.

The start of the road to the title

On 8 July the Mid-Stakes Championship event with a $3,000 buy-in got under way at the WSOP. Yanting Jiang was among the entrants, starting in flight 1b. The amateur finished day one with a stack of 266,000 chips. That put her in 28th place and saw her advance.

After the three starting flights and the close of late registration, the tournament field reached 3,668 players. Among the entrants were plenty of notable and decorated players: five-time bracelet winner David Peters, Hall of Fame member John Juanda, 2014 Main Event champion Martin Jacobson, WSOP Circuit ring record holder Maurice Hawkins and others. Day two began with 923 players fighting for the trophy, and by the end of the day their number had been cut to 167.

At that point Yanting Jiang was still just "one of many". The amateur did not draw much attention with flashy moves at the table, nor did she behave in the style of Martin Kabrhel. Jiang refrained from table talk not only out of modesty, but also because English is her second language, while her native tongue is Mandarin Chinese, which hardly any of her opponents were likely to speak.

Over the course of the day Jiang lost most of her stack, but she managed to hold on to 26 big blinds to advance in 116th place in the chip count. And yet by that point our heroine had already outlasted multiple WSOP champions Alex Foxen, Jeff Madsen and David Peters, legendary players Leo Margets and Shiina Okamoto, as well as high roller Felipe Boianovsky.

A breakthrough on her birthday

Day three of the event was a special one for Yanting Jiang, as it fell on her birthday. However, she spent the first half of it playing steadily and cautiously, gradually building her stack. The turning point came in the middle of the day, when she won a big pot in a hand against the leader of the Thai All-Time Money List, Punnat Punsri.

Jiang opened from the button for 200,000, Punsri defended from the big blind, checked on a K♣️2♥️8♦️ flop and faced a 125,000 continuation bet from his opponent. The Thai high roller responded with a check-raise to 375,000, and Jiang called. On the 9♣️ turn Punnat checked again, our heroine bet 700,000 and the Thai called. On the A♠️ river, after a long think, Punsri called Jiang's bet of 1,200,000. The American had made top pair with A♣️7♣️, while her opponent mucked his hand. That was how Yanting Jiang collected 2.2 million chips and began her climb to the top of the chip count. 

Soon after, Jiang eliminated WSOP bracelet holder Michal Sucha, hitting trip kings on the turn. Later in the day, the American had a hand in two more eliminations. First, she personally sent Portugal's Manuel Almeida de Carvalho to the rail thanks to a full house on the turn. Then a flush that arrived on the river helped her strip Marius Gierse of most of his stack. The Austrian quickly lost his remaining chips in a hand against Chan Yun and busted in 18th place.

A tough fight for the trophy

16 players made it to the final day. And Yingting Jiang led the pack, having amassed 31 million chips. Her lead over her closest rival, Chan Yun, was nearly twofold. However, plenty of strong opponents remained in the fight. Among them were Maurice Hawkins, two-time bracelet holder Barry Shulman, WSOP, WPT and EPT champion Roberto Romanello, and two-time WSOP Main Event finalist Mark Newhouse.

The final day began with several quick eliminations. Jiang was responsible for one of them. The American stripped Romanian Petre Ionescu of his last chips, catching a pair of tens on the flop. After that came an extremely long final table bubble. Over the next six hours, not a single player busted, while short stacks doubled up 13 times. 

The hero of one such double-up was Maurice Hawkins. The 25-time WSOP Circuit ring holder shoved his last big blind with A♠️7♠️ in a hand against Jiang, who held A♦️5♦️. On a board of 6♠️8♦️2♠️3♣️A♣️, the seven helped Hawkins survive and double up.

By that point, Yingting Jiang was no longer the chip leader. She had ceded that title to Chan Yun, who, in a head-to-head hand against her, made a straight on the turn and boosted his stack by 13 million chips. Then Dylan Liew also overtook our heroine, scooping a large pot in a hand against her. Shortly after that, Yun doubled up again through Jiang with pocket jacks against A♣️Q♥️. 

The long resistance of the short stacks ended with the elimination of Luis Yepes in tenth place. After that, the number of contenders for the title started shrinking quickly. Jiang, meanwhile, began reclaiming lost ground. The amateur first won a big pot against Yun, then eliminated Vasileos Panayotidis and Michael Rocco.

The showdown between Jiang and Yun became the central storyline of the final day. After several more pots against her fellow countryman, our heroine managed to pull back into the lead. On level 38, she overtook Yun by making two pair on the turn against a pair of aces. 

After that, Yingting Jiang could no longer be stopped. Her next victim was Dylan Liew, who got it in with A♣️K♥️ against the amateur's pocket fives on a turn of A♥️3♦️5♥️10♣️ and was left with no outs heading to the river of 2♣️. Right after him, the poker player eliminated Maurice Hawkins on her second attempt — he had managed to spin up again after his 1 BB survival, only to lose most of his stack once more. In his final hand, he went all-in preflop with A♣️Q♦️, and Jiang called with 10♦️7♦️. On a river of 6♣️6♠️6♦️5♠️7♥️, the amateur hit a full house, which earned her another 13 million chips.

Yingting Jiang also arranged the heads-up herself, sending Yueqi Zhu — who finished third — to the rail as well. The American's opponent in the head-to-head clash was, of course, Chan Yun. At the start of the heads-up, the amateur's chip advantage was fivefold. Yun managed to win a big pot, but a few hands later it was all over. 

Chan Yun, holding A♠️9♠️, shoved his last 20,5 million chips, and Jiang called with J♥️6♥️. On a flop of K♥️5♣️A♦️, Yun kept the lead, having made top pair. However, the turn 10♥️ gave our heroine a flush draw, which came in on the river 5♥️. Jiang's main rival on the final day ultimately fell short and walked away with $772,580 for second place.

A mark in history

Yingting Jiang created one of the biggest sensations of the summer and showed that in modern poker, full of professionals, amateurs can still fight for the biggest prizes. Jiang earned a previously unimaginable $1,159,182 for herself. The champion found the triumph hard to grasp, but she knew for certain what she would spend the winnings on first — her children:

«I still can't believe it. I got lucky. I'm a single mother, and I just pray for whatever God sends me. The first thing I want to do is take my kids on a vacation».

And it would not be an exaggeration to say that Yingting Jiang wrote her name into WSOP history. At the festival just held in Las Vegas, she became only the third female poker player to win an open event. Before her, bracelets in such tournaments were won by Kristen Foxen ($25,000 High Roller NLH) and Michelle Chin ($1,500 Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw). Will our heroine surprise everyone again at the World Series in 2027? Only time will give the answer to that question.