| Oakville,
Ontario, 10th September 1998
- If Chris Smith can finish the season the way he finished the first
round of the Bell Canadian Open today, he won't have to worry about keeping his
PGA Tour card. Playing
his best golf after his worst shots, Smith closed with three birdies and an eagle
for a 6-under-par 66, giving him his best start of the year and a two-stroke lead
on the hard, fast and wind-whipped Glen Abbey Golf Club. Tim
Herron, trying to win a tournament for the third straight year, bogeyed the last
hole and slipped into the group of six players at 4-under 68 that included Billy
Andrade, Scott Verplank and Dudley Hart. "When
I got in trouble, I was able to come back and do something good," said Smith,
who took only 25 putts on greens that featured Sunday-type pin positions. "The
course wasn't giving anything up today." Smith
snatched a 66 with iron play that set up four birdies inside 15 feet and booming
drives that allowed him to play the par-5s in 4-under. He charged into the lead
with a 341-yard drive that left him only a 9-iron into the par-5 18th, which he
drilled downwind to 8 feet for eagle. Jeff
Sluman, coming off a win last week in Milwaukee,
was 6-under at one point until three straight bogeys dropped him into the group
at 69. Another stroke back was Ernie Els, playing only his 15th PGA Tour event
this year and trying to get into the top 30 on the money list. Smith's
situation is far more dire. Having
missed 13 cuts in 25 events, he is 132nd on the money list and needs a strong
finish to avoid going to qualifying school, where he has never played well enough
to earn his card. "You
want to try to block it out as much as you can, but that's pretty unrealistic,"
Smith said. "It's a thought that's with you. If you're on the bubble like
I am, it's a little bit tougher. It's something that's definitely in the back
of my mind." Smith
earned his PGA Tour card for 1996 by finishing seventh on the Nike Tour money
list. He was 206th in earnings that year and found himself back on the junior
circuit. A year ago, he became the first player to earn a "battlefield promotion"
to the PGA by winning three Nike events in one year. At
times Thursday, it was like being on the Nike Tour again. "I've
been waiting for a week where everything started hitting at the same time,"
Smith said. "I played really well last year on the Nike Tour, and today was
a day that I had a lot of last year, where everything seemed really easy."
That wasn't
the case for USPGA champion Vijay Singh. Playing for the sixth week in a row,
Singh shot a 2-over 74 for his worst opening round since a 75 in the season-opening
Mercedes Championship in January. Even
in the softness of the morning, the greens were like thin carpet over hardwood
floors. Pins tucked along the ridges on the Jack Nicklaus-designed greens made
it even more difficult. Smith
bogeyed No. 3 with a three-putt from 45 feet, but answered with a sand wedge that
stopped 2 feet away for birdie on No. 4 and an up-and-down from off the green
on the par-5 fifth hole for another birdie. His
only other bogey came on the par-4 14th. After driving in the bunker and coming
up short, his third shot caught the ridge and rolled 30 feet away. But he birdied
the next three holes, then finished it off with an eagle. "Fortunately
after my mistakes, I came back with birdies," he said. "That's what
you have to do to score good." Andrade,
having his worst season since his rookie year in 1988, also got off to a strong
start with birdies on five of the first 10 holes and pars on the five holes through
the valley of Glen Abbey. His only lapse was a bogey on No. 17, where he failed
to get up and down from the bunker. "It
wasn't a great finish, but I honestly can't say I threw too many shots away,"
said Andrade, who is 103rd on the money list. Hart's
only mistake came in the middle of his round. Starting on No. 10, he was 3-under
for the day when he pulled his 3-iron into No. 18, causing spectators to scatter
on a hill left of the green. He tried to get it close despite an awkward lie,
and the ball ran through the green and into the water. He wound up with a bogey.
"I tried
to pull off a miracle shot," Hart said. "This course can jump up and
get you real quick if you try to get real greedy." DIVOTS:
Bell Canada signed a new five-year deal Thursday as the title sponsor of the Canadian
Open. | 
