The International Pool Tour is a professional sports tour created in 2005 by Kevin Trudeau. It aims to elevate pocket billiards, specifically 8-ball, to the level of other modern sports. Closely modeled on the PGA tour, the IPT is offering the largest prize funds in pool history, including over $8 million in its first full year, 2006. This has attracted the interest of some of the top pool players in the world. It's also different from the many 9-Ball tournaments, as all IPT events are Eight ball games with very strict rules. Many pool enthusiasts were skeptical initially at the launch, but the first event was successful. Some of the best pool players in the world competed in the IPT for enormous payouts. Winning US$250,000 or more was a tremendous boon to a professional pool player who previously might typically only win $5,000 to $15,000 for a tournament victory.
Shortly after being founded in 2005, Deno Andrews was brought on as Tour Director. However, the IPT in 2006 then failed to pay participants as it claimed it would and critics point to this event as having had major negative effects on the pool world as a whole.
