Super High Roller Bowl Day 2: Amateurs Shine, Bonomo Ascends to Top

Mo Nuwwarah

May 30, 2017 2 min read Last updated May 26, 2018

The $300,000 Super High Roller Bowl at ARIA continued on Memorial Day and the field was cut from 44 runners to just 19. Justin Bonomo rose to the top of the counts as he finished with a stack of 2,628,000.

Bonomo had a nice start to the day as he eliminated Antonio Esfandiari when both players made kings up, but Bonomo's king-queen bested Esfandiari's king-three. He also eliminated dangerous opponent Nick Petrangelo when a short-stacked Petrangelo jammed a flush draw and Bonomo had flopped a set.

Later in the day, Bonomo flopped trip sevens with eight-seven of hearts. Bonomo check-called the flop against Rainer Kempe, and after both players checked the turn, Bonomo fired a big overbet on the river after all the draws missed and got paid off.

However, while a well-known pro heads the list of remaining players, it was a great day for amateur players at the SHRB. Not one, not two, but all of five amateurs bagged stacks that put them in the top 10.

Dan Shak (1,482,000), Bill Klein (1,466,000), Leon Tsoukernik (1,335,000), Cary Katz (701,000) and David Einhorn (685,000) are all looking good heading into Day 3. King's Casino owner Tsoukernik won the EPT Prague $50K High Roller late last year, and Shak has historically been one of the most successful amateurs in these events.

The most well-known amateur in the event, actor and comedian Kevin Hart, failed to bag. However, he did have himself quite a day as he collected perhaps the most impressive scalp of anyone in the tournament.

Hart busted high roller extraordinaire Fedor Holz, who has been unstoppable in these events the past couple of years. It did take a cooler though, as Hart picked up aces when Holz was dealt queens.

Hart ultimately fell when he ran ace-jack into Brian Rast's kings. Others going bust included Dan Colman, Isaac Haxton, David Peters, Bryn Kenney, Doug Polk, and "Tony G." Guoga.

Day 3 resumes at 1 p.m., and PokerNews will again handle live reporting duties while PokerGo offers a live streaming service.