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The World Poker Tour ventured into new territory in 2010 with its stop at the Hollywood Casino in Indiana, and the Main Event brought 144 players to the out-of-the-way casino, making a prize pool of $1,331,616 and awarding nearly $394K to Carlos Mortensen for the win. This year, the WPT was facing a tough road to match much of that, as Mortensen instead traveled to the NAPT at Mohegan Sun rather than defend his title, and the direct tournament conflict posed a problem.

Registration for the WPT Indiana was open through the start of Day 2, so the numbers reached on Day 1 were not final. With that said, there were 92 players on Day 1, and some of them who tried but failed to make it through the day included Steve Brecher, Dwyte Pilgrim, Joseph Cheong, and Vivek Rajkumar. But when the day concluded, the 57 remaining players were led by Ali Eslami (pictured above) with 147K chips, and also still in the running were names like Allen Kessler, Chris Bell, Shannon Shorr, Jonathan Little, Jack McClelland, Mike Sexton, and Jerri Thomas.

As Day 2 played on, it was announced that the final numbers were in:

Players: 97
Prize pool: $911,800
First place prize: $273,664
Paid finishers: 12

It was the lowest turnout for a WPT Main Event since the tour’s inception. Whether there were too many conflicts for players – EPT in Berlin, NAPT at Mohegan Sun, etc. – or the casino was too far off the beaten path, players did not show up to support it in great numbers this year. With that said, though, a $273K first place prize is still a big deal for some players, and a WPT title is always important.

Play continues to the final table scheduled for April 13.

All information and photos courtesy of the World Poker Tour Live Updates team.