The Dubliner turned in a blistering 31, only one outside the record, and then holed a 12-foot putt for his sixth birdie on the 490-yard par four 11th, one of nine holes lengthened since last April.

Harrington covered the first 12 holes in six under par and led by three at that stage. And even when he bunkered his tee shot to the treacherous short 12th, he saved a good par and there were still two reachable par fives to come.

He was in prime position off the tee at the 13th, the first of those par fives, and had only 184 yards left. But he tugged it left and the ball went into Rae's Creek. Forced to take a penalty drop he ran up a bogey six and, with Davis Love making birdie on the 14th, Harrington was suddenly only one ahead.

Harrington made a mess of the 14th as well. His drive hit the trees on the right and from just short of the green in two his chip rolled 30 feet from the hole.

The resultant bogey cost him the lead, Love two-putting the long 15th for a birdie that took him to five under and ahead by one.

In dire need of regaining his composure, Harrington just missed birdie putts on the 15th, 16th and 17th and in between was spoken to by an official, presumably about slow play.

On the 18th he pulled his approach shot in the left hand rough and missed his par putt for a 69 not a bad score, but not what his early form had promised.

The newspapers and airwaves here have forewarned how the lengthening of Augusta by 285 yards would produce a monster capable of whipping the technology-boosted elite of world golf back into shape.

And to a great degree it did, with most of the 89-man Masters field chipping away at par with their long irons rather than cutting huge chunks out of it with their sand irons and pitching wedges, the principal motivating factor for the revamp in the first place.

Like the rest of the Masters field, Harrington had spent the past few days ruminating on the changes to nine of the Augusta National holes. Not only did he welcome them as positive progress, he also said the effects would not be as draconian as many were suggesting. Clearly, he brought this positive mindset with him to the first yesterday morning and a drive which, for Harrington and virtually everyone else in the field, was fraught with considerably more caution than before the tee box was put back 35 yards and the fairway bunker had grown into a complex.

He literally ripped his drive down the left, setting himself up for a nice, settling par on a hole which rated as the toughest in play yesterday, yielding only two birdies.

Birdies at the huge par five second and the relatively short but tricky third hinted that something really special might be afoot.

And as Harrington reached the turn with five birdies on his card, Irish pulses began to race.