ZeeJustin on top in WSOP's $40k bonanza

Justin Bonomo is leader of the pack after 18 levels of $40k NLHE excitement.

Two days into the most expensive No Limit Hold'em tournament in World Series of Poker history and Justin Bonomo remains unruffled.

The Bodog pro ended Day 2 of the WSOP's Event 2 - the $40,000 NLHE event - chipleader among the tournament's 23 survivors.

"I've had extremely smooth sailing for the entire tournament," Bonomo told PokerListings.com at the conclusion of play on Friday. "I've been lucky."

In a day that featured plenty of fireworks - with Day 1 chipleaders Bruno Fitoussi and Chris Moneymaker both experiencing disastrous collapses - Bonomo told PokerListings he accumulated his tournament-best 2,678,000 stack in rather boring fashion.

"I've been so lucky that I haven't played any big pots," he said. "I've been playing a lot of small pots and chipping up and basically every pot I've played I've won."

Bonomo's biggest win came at the expense of "Crazy" Marco Johnson, whose A♠ Q♠ failed to hold against his K♣ T♣ just a few eliminations shy of the money.

Other than that hand, however, it's been a steady climb.

"I haven't had any big decisions," said Bonomo. "I think I've been in the top ten in chips since the first hour of Day 1."

At the end of play yesterday, Mike "The Mouth" Matusow sounded off to PokerListings.com about the structure for this event.

AQ v K10 on bubble? That's crazy.

The Full Tilt pro took issue with the hour-long levels and 200/400 starting blinds.

Bonomo, however, saw no problems where structure was concerned.

"I like the structure," he said. "Some players have been screaming that it's not an eight-day event or whatever, but obviously [the WSOP] didn't want to do that.

"For a normal bracelet event it's great. Including levels like a 9,000/18,000 is a great idea."

With a buy-in about equal to a normal American's yearly salary, registration for this event was an exclusive affair. But that didn't mean every one of the 201 entrants was particularly talented, said Bonomo.

"The standard of play in this event was extremely varied," he said. "I was lucky to have had a lot of amateurs at my first table.

"I flopped a set against one guy and he got all-in against me with pocket aces when we were still really deep."

Not Bonomo's bogeyman!

Now that only 23 players are left, however, the field has been distilled into something resembling a poker all-star team.

ZeeJustin will share felt on Day 3 with the likes of Brian Townsend, Ted Forrest, Andrew "Good2CU" Robl and Greg Raymer.

Forrest (2,586,000) and Raymer (2,287,000) finished Day 2 in second and fourth on the leaderboard, respectively, while sixth-place Keith Lehr will sit on Bonomo's direct left tomorrow.

Still, he likes his chances.

"I like my table draw," he said. "I think I have good position on a lot of the better players at my table and a lot of the tough players in the tournament are on other tables."

Among those tough survivors are Lex "RaSZi" Veldhuis, Alec Torelli, Brian Townsend, Noah Schwartz, David Chiu and Neil Channing.

Vanessa Rousso, J.C. Tran, David Pham and Sorel Mizzi were eliminated just after the bursting of the bubble near the conclusion of play on Thursday. All four will earn $71,858.

The tournament's 23 survivors will return at 2 p.m. tomorrow to play down to a nine-handed final table. You can get comprehensive coverage in the PokerListings.com WSOP section.