Day 1 at First Stage

Fired an even-par 71 in the first round, which has me tied for 27th. The top-23 spots and ties advance out of this First Stage Site. I played pretty solid today, with one ouchie. 7 Fairways, 13 Greens, 28 putts, 1 for 1 sand saves. Here are the highlights and lowlights from the round...

-Good start on number one, 2-iron down middle of fairway, pitching wedge to 4 foot, made it for birdie, -1

-Hit the next 3 greens, made pars

-The 5th hole is a driveable par-4, which I can reach with 3-wood. However, the pin was tucked in a spot today, where if I didn't knock it on the green I'd have an extremely difficult up and down. I layed up with a 5-iron and hit a lob wedge to 4 feet and made it for birdie, -2

-Pull-hooked my next two drives, but made scrambling pars.

-Drained a 30-footer for birdie on the difficult par 3, 8th, -3

- Disaster strikes. After those bad hooks on 6 and 7, i decide to hit 3-wood on 9. I hook it into some trees, it kicks into the water. I have to drop in the trees, and with my 3rd shot, I hit a tree and it bounces back over my shoulder into the water. Drop again, make a quadruple bogie 8. +1

-Bad 2-irons on 10 and 11, bogie ten, get up and down from a divot in the fairway on 11 from 150 out to stop the bleeding, +2

- Stick it on 12 to 4 feet, but miss it.

-Pitching wedge to 6 feet on 13, and a great flop shot on 14 net me a pair of birdie 4's on the par-5s, E

- Great sand save on 15, followed by 3 ho-hum pars to finish the round, E

Lots more golf left to play, and as long as I eliminate the mistakes (like 9) I'll be in good shape.