Minnesota’s Aaron Johnson won the prestigious $1,100 buy-in WPT Prime Championship, winning $1,000,000 plus a $10,400 seat to the 2026 WPT World Championship. After outlasting a 9,876-entry field, Johnson became just the fifth player from the state of Minnesota ever to produce a seven-figure score, joining Mike Schneider, Michael Wilklow, Jason Senti, and Michael Simon. Johnson also launched himself into third place on Minnesota’s all-time money list, behind only Blake Bohn and Ryan Laplante.
Johnson and Fernando Del Campo struck a heads-up deal, with the Mexican player taking home $942,480 in just his sixth-career recorded live tournament cash. Prior to the tournament, Del Campo had earned just over $18,000 in career live tournament earnings.
For Johnson, this tournament meant he finally had his redemption for a recent close call in another super-large field event. Just a year ago, he finished second in the $1,500 WSOP MonsterStack, an 8,703-entry field, barely missing out on a WSOP bracelet. Though the $732,329 was over seven-and-a-half times his previous high score, this time all the glory belongs to him.
“This means everything to me,” said Johnson. “I’ve had good runs, good years, and good results, but this one tops everything by far. Being a WPT event, being a gigantic event, it’s truly everything to me.”
A two-week affair
The WPT Prime Championship was a two-week affair that involved four Day 1s, three additional days of poker, and a five-day break before the start of the six-man final table. In fact, there were 1,110 entries on day 1A, 1,720 on day 1B, 3,101 on day 1C, and 3,945 on day 1D.
Before the final table, several huge names enjoyed deep runs, including WSOP bracelet winner Rafael Reis (12th, $89,000), Stephen Song (18th, $53,000), Jeremy Becker (19th, $53,000), Ronnie Day (22nd, $41,000), Esther Taylor (26th, $32,000), and Derek Kwan (31st, $32,000).
Eventually, the field would be reduced to just six players on Day 4. Joining the MSPT Hall of Famer Johnson and the previously unknown Del Campo were WSOP bracelet winner Safiya Umerova, WPT champion Qing Liu, MSPT Main Event champion Timothy Burden, and Uri Foox, with Foox also being a native Minnesotan. They had all locked up $250,000 before the cards even went into the air.
Final table theatrics
It didn’t take long for some insane drama to take place on the final table, with Johnson earning a full double through Qing Liu to jump into the chip lead on just the third hand of final table play. On a K-Q-J-J-K runout, Liu jammed his A-5 suited from the big blind after calling the flop and raising the turn. Johnson, not fearing the king, snapped him off with pocket queens for a full house to win a massive pot worth nearly 125,000,000 – well over 60 big blinds at the time.
Shortly thereafter, it was the tale of Del Campo and ace-eight. First, he eliminated Foox’s ace-eight with pocket kings before cracking Burden’s pocket tens with ace-eight to reduce the field to four. Despite the terrible bad beat, Burden collected a healthy $325,000 for his efforts, an incredible payday for a player whose previous high score was $68,149 back in 2018.
Liu goes down in shocking fashion
Del Campo would continue his reign of terror in four-handed play, when he was dealt ace-king against Liu’s ace-queen. Despite Liu having a ton of chips, they would all go Del Campo’s way as they got it all in preflop. Liu would fail to improve and was eliminated in fourth place for $430,000.
The last woman standing
The very next hand, Safiya Umerova would be eliminated, sending the tournament into heads-up play. Umerova ran her king-ten offsuit and 12 big blinds into Johnson’s pocket aces. Her third-place finish gave her a career-high $575,000. Sure enough, despite only 29 hands having been played in final table play, it was Johnson and Del Campo for all the marbles.
A heads-up deal
Del Campo went in with a massive three-to-one chip lead, holding 119 big blinds to Johnson’s 46 to begin head-up play. However, the lead wouldn’t last very long as Johnson went on an incredible heater to make it a virtually even fight. The two left to make a deal, and suddenly both players were guaranteed an insane $942,480 payday. They would continue to play for the title and an additional $57,520 plus the $10,400 seat to next year’s WPT World Championship.
From then on, Johnson showcased his undeniable dominance, proving why he’s been one of the better mid-stakes players in poker for several years against a player with just five recorded live cashes. Eventually, Johnson was able to get Del Campo down to just three big blinds and won with queen-ten against Del Campo’s seven-four, spiking a ten on the river to secure the seven-figure payday.
