The inaugural season of the World Poker Tour's Ladies league came to an end on on Friday with the crowning of Nancy Todd Tyner, first place winner of the WPTL Championship at Bellagio. Tyner, a political consultant that specializes in gaming issues, was able to best a tough field of 144 women and 6 men, to take the title and the $68,640 first prize.

WPT Boot Camp Graduate, Tyner, had only been playing poker for 18 months and it would be safe to say that nobody saw her as the favorite going into the final table. Indeed, most eyes were on professional poker player Vanessa Selbst, by far the most experienced player at the table and also coincidentally, the player with the most chips. Tyner herself admitted that she was "definitely the underdog." Yet despite Selbst's huge chip advantage, she couldn't take out the wily Tyner and eventually would have to settle for second place money when her A-2 ran into Tyner's A-K, after almost two hours of heads-up play.

The World Poker Tour Ladies league should be very happy with their new champion, as well as with their first season overall. Since the WPTL was launched in January, they have already held numerous successful tournaments in some of the best casinos around the country and have also raised more than $51,000 for their official charity sponsor, Susan G Komen for the Cure, a nonprofit organization dedicated to raising awareness and funding for breast cancer research. With so much early success and with more and more women taking up the game every day, the WPTL looks to be a fixture in tournament poker for years to come.

The official payouts for the WPTL Championship were as follows:

1st - Nancy Todd Tyner - $68,640
2nd - Vanessa Selbst - $40,815
3rd - Cindy Kerslake - $20,405
4th - Janice Kim - $11,125
5th - Donna Varlotto - $8,350
6th - Van Nguyen - $6,495