Hong Pham has pulled off the miraculous feat of winning the UK Poker Championship (UKPC) Main Event, defeating a star-studded field to win the £101,000 ($136,348) top prize. Pham topped the 1,159-entry field in the £560 event, which generated a prize pool of £556,320, topping the £500,000 guarantee after six Day 1 flights. With the win, Pham becomes the first woman in history to win the prestigious UKPC Main Event title.
What made the UKPC Main Event victory even sweeter for Pham is that she came out the champion after three 12-hour days while 35 weeks pregnant.
Although it’s just four weeks into the new year, the win, plus her two other results this year, puts Pham into the number one slot in the 2026 GPI Women’s Player of the Year race.
A fairy tale run
While Day 3 chip leader Amir Zaregarizi had a nightmare, finishing 10th, Pham went on a fairy-tale run to UKPC Main Event victory. She came into the 16-player Day 3 as a huge underdog, having only bagged nine big blinds, the shortest remaining stack. However, as the poker adage goes, a chip and a chair are all you need.
Pham rode her early momentum and came in as the final-table chip leader. The final table moved at a rather slow pace, finishing in just over six hours, with Pham chip-leading the majority of the time. With three players left, English pro Paul Tait proposed a deal, and Pham ultimately rejected it herself.
That ended up being a wise decision. Tait would finish third for £43,450, shoving a turned flush draw into Pham’s slowplayed pocket aces. This set up a heads-up battle with Haydn Dickinson, with Pham holding a slim chip lead.
Pham absolutely dominated heads-up play, chipping away at Dickinson until he was down to just seven bigs. While Dickinson managed to double up once, he could not spin it back. An hour into heads-up play, Dickinson shoved ace-five into Pham’s pocket kings. Her kings would hold, and she was crowned the UKPC Main Event champion. Dickinson received £63,000 for his runner-up finish.
Redemption for Pham
Pham saw the UKPC Main Event as redemption for what happened three years ago, when she finished second in the 2023 WSOP Circuit Main Event. That was Pham’s previous live high score (£64,500/$77,957), and it took place in the very same poker room.
That second-place finish has haunted Pham, until now.
“I was so gutted I couldn’t win, and it haunted me a lot. Now, I have a baby on the way, and I really wanted to get a win before labor,” Pham told Poker.Pro.
“I was at another final table last week and couldn’t win that either. Dusk Till Dawn is my home casino, where I usually run well. I think the feel here, the structure, the payouts, everything is perfect. Now, I’ve won, and I’ve manifested about this moment, getting a picture of my baby with the trophy.”
An extraordinary career
Pham is anything but an amateur. She’s been a constant face in the England poker scene long before this UKPC Main Event title. According to The Hendon Mob, she’s accumulated $522,209 in live tournament earnings since June 2021, when she kicked off her live career with a win in a 38-entry £550 tournament at The Vic in London for £6,650 ($9,186). Just a year later, she experienced her first deep run in a bigger field, finishing fifth in the 371-entry Aspers Autumn Festival Main Event for £10,210 ($11,694). That’s when Pham’s career really took off.
Her second-placed finish in the WSOP Circuit Main Event in Nottingham took place just a few months later, followed by a sixth-place finish in the 888Live London Festival Main Event (£12,100/$15,000) just a few weeks after that.
The number of accolades is long. She’s won a Grosvenor 25/50 Series title in Reading, had a pair of huge scores in Vietnam, and even made the WSOP Europe Colossus final table in 2024, taking ninth for €24,750 ($27,577) in the 2,799-entry field.
In just a short period of time, Pham has ascended the women’s all-time money list and now sits in 161st place.
UKPC Main Event final results
| Position | Player Name | Country | Amount |
| 1 | Hong Pham | England | £101,000 |
| 2 | Haydn Dickinson | England | £63,000 |
| 3 | Paul Tait | England | £43,450 |
| 4 | Jacque Ramsden | England | £29,370 |
| 5 | Nicholas Rose | England | £20,250 |
| 6 | Stephen Blow | England | £14,250 |
| 7 | Jose Bazan | England | £10,250 |
| 8 | John Hall | England | £7,250 |
| 9 | Alistair Massie | England | £5,250 |
