Minutes ago, players ceased for their 90-minute dinner break in Event #43, the $1.5K Pot Limit Omaha 8 tournament. Prior to their refueling opportunity, several PocketFivers remained patient and waiting for the right opportunity to make a move.

We caught up with Chris “SKOAL” Falconer (pictured at left), who guarded a stack of 8,600 and reported that he’d had three times to move up the count to 20K but was rivered or had to fold. He explained that his earlier run in the tournament had him down to nearly fumes, but the key to his ongoing success in the WSOP has been patience, patience, patience. Though the average stack at the start of the break was a hair over 12K, Chris remained optimistic about his chances as he doubled up in the last level.

Meanwhile, Eric “Rizen” Lynch was checking down the river when we visited his table after what looked like some aggressive preflop action in the pot. His opponent was quite surprised when his hand held and Eric threw his cards to the dealer; Eric claimed to muck A-K, but didn’t hit a thing on the board. His patience was paying off as his stack rose to an above-average 13K.

Garrett “GBecks” Beckman, however, was not content to stay out of the line of fire and was getting nowhere fast. PocketFives found Garrett with a 9K stack, seated at a table across from a big-stacked Joe Hachem. When Garrett was in the big blind for 400, the cutoff limped and the player on the button made it 1,800. Garrett sighed as he folded. The next hand, from the small blind Garrett saw four players limp in, including Hachem. He completed the blind and the board came 3J8. Two early players checked, the third short stack moved in for almost all his chips, and Hachem called. Again, Garrett folded to the action and forfeited his blinds while the short stack chopped the pot with Hachem.

However, the next hand on the button, the same early short stack moved in, one opponent called, and Garrett raised to a total of 6,200. He flipped over AA79 to his opponent’s 2-3-8-6. The board ran out 34257 and Garrett doubled his opponent up. His stack was down to 5.5K — about the same as he held an hour ago.

Regardless of the loss, Garrett fared much better than other players of note who were recently eliminated: Rolf Slotboom and Stu “TheDonator” Patterson recently took their leave. As of the break, here are chip counts for those still fighting:

Matt “SamENole” Smith - 26K
Dan “Stainley88″ Adams - 20K
Matt “plattsburgh” Vengrin - 15K
Eric “Rizen” Lynch - 13K
Chris “SKOAL” Falconer - 8.6K
Shannon Shorr - 8.5K
Garrett “GBecks” Beckman - 5.5K

• June 25, 2008 -- Shorr Silences Minneapolis Meehan
• June 25, 2008 -- Bad Moon Rizen
• June 24, 2008 -- “You Know You Have a Good Table When…”
• June 28, 2008 -- CrazyMarco, Roothlus Chip Up