Shawn Daniels Wins World Poker Tour Rolling Thunder Main Event

Placerville, Ca. native Shawn Daniels took down his first World Poker Tour title by winning his hometown title.

Daniels beat out a field of 404 entries in the WPT Rolling Thunder main event at Thunder Valley Casino Wednesday evening. The Lincoln casino, like Placerville, is part of the greater Sacramento area.

Daniels earned $218,600 for besting the $3,500 no-limit hold’em. It’s the second-largest score of his career, behind only his victory in the 2023 World Series of Poker $777 no-limit hold’em for $777,777. His WPT win bumps his career earnings north of $3.2 million.

As with all main event champions on the tour, Daniels’ name will be added to the Mike Sexton WPT Champions Cup.

“To get my name on the cup is very special,” Daniels told WPT reporters. “It’s just something that means a lot and that I’ll remember forever."

This was the second final-table finish of the year for Daniels. It came with 1,080 Card Player Player of the Year points. With 1,164 total points, he now sits inside the top 80 in the 2025 POY standings presented by Global Poker.

The top 51 finishers earned a piece of the $1,292,800 prize pool in this event, with notables like two-time WPT champion J.C. Tran (20th), poker commentator Jeff Platt (17th), 2023 WPT World Championship winner Daniel Sepiol (11th), all-time WSOP Circuit rings leader Ari Engel (8th), and 2012 WPT Grand Prix de Paris winner Matthew Salsberg (7th) all running deep.

The final day began with 2023 WSOPC Choctaw main event champion Harvey Castro leading the final six players. Three-time WPT champion Eric Afriat was also still in contention, starting the day in the middle of the pack, while Daniels sat in fifth chip position to start.

Benjamin Primus was knocked out just a few hands into the day, with his K-8 unable to come from behind against the A-K of Castro. Primus earned $53,000 as the sixth-place finisher. David Ha soon joined Primus on the rail when his J-10 clashed with the A-7 of Paul Richardson. Ha picked up an open-ended straight draw on the turn to go with his two live cards, but a blank on the end sent him packing with $69,000.

Daniels scored his first elimination of the day when his A3 bested the 99 of Richardson. Daniels raised from the button for 350,000 and called the 950,000 shove of Richardson from the small blind. Daniels made aces up by the river to win the pot. Richardson earned $91,000 as the fourth-place finisher.

Eric Afriat

Castro held 13,900,000 to Daniels’ 6,150,000 when heads-up play began. It was a back and forth affair, with both players holding the lead and having chances to close it out. At some point along the way, the final two hashed out a deal to redistribute the remaining prize money a bit.

Daniels was well out in front when the final hand of the event arrived. Castro shoved from the button with Q2 for just a handful of big blinds. Danielsl called with 86 and the board came down K766J to give Daniels trip sixes for the win.

Castro earned $193,600 as the runner-up, the third-largest score of his career. He now has more than $1.1 million in career cashes to his name. Check out a replay of the final table live stream below.

Final Table Results

Photos provided by WPT.

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