Tough greens limit low scores

Forget about the rough, which looked more like a Marine's flattop than the shaggy stuff typical of a U.S. Open.

Those extra 25 yards on No. 17? No problem for Davis Love III, who hit a sand wedge into 8 feet for birdie and a share of the lead with Scott McCarron and Brandel Chamblee in the first round of the Masters.

The real change today at Augusta National was David Duval.

He finally looked human.

The hottest player in golf, the anointed favorite for the green jacket, Duval was tied for the lead at 3-under when he headed to the back nine as storm clouds gathered. The wraparound shades came off, and Duval came unglued.

He missed the next six greens. He stopped making those par-saving putts. He proved that not even the No. 1 player in the world is immune from the one constant at Augusta that may never change -- its brick-hard greens and unpredictable nature.

"If you want to win this event, you better find a way to deal with it," said Duval, who was hanging on at 1-under after 17 when play was suspended by darkness.

Despite all the hoopla over all the changes, Augusta National was up to its same old tricks.

Love, Chamblee and McCarron survived the sloping, brick-hard greens in the first round to share the lead at 69. Better yet, they didn't have to deal with a 95-minute storm delay that changed Augusta even more -- from hot, hazy and sun-baked to stormy, swirling winds.

Nick Price, one of 12 players left on the course when play was suspended by darkness, was also at 3-under and will return Friday morning to play the 18th.

Defending champion Mark O'Meara birdied the 18th for the second straight round. This one got him to 2-under 70, along with Colin Montgomerie, Justin Leonard, defending U.S. Open champion Lee Janzen and former Masters champ Jose Maria Olazabal.

Two-time U.S. Open champion Ernie Els three-putted the 18th for double bogey to fall back to 71, tied with Greg Norman. Tiger Woods survived a triple bogey at No. 8, a par 5, and finished at 72 to tie with a couple of amateurs -- Sergio Garcia and Trevor Immelman.

"It was a long, hard day," O'Meara said.

Tell that to Duval.

Two of the six greens he missed were par-5s. The real killer was No. 13, the easiest hole on the course, where Duval hooked his 3-wood into Rae's Creek and took bogey.

He finally birdied the 17th from 3 feet to get to 1-under when play was suspended, and Duval had all night to contemplate what Augusta always offers -- unpredictability on one of the most fickle courses.

"On a course like this, you're going to run into some bad stuff," Duval said. "You try to outweigh it with the good stuff."

Almost all of the good and bad seemed to take place on the treacherous, tabletop greens.

Love noticed as much while walking down the 14th and 15th fairways. Ahead on the greens, course officials were dousing them with water, trying to keep them from becoming as hard as concrete.

"You can tell," Love said as a sly smile crept over his face, "they've got them right where they want them."

They were right on the edge of going from unrelenting to unfair. And that left players walking the fine line between a solid round and disaster.

"You just don't want to blow yourself out the first day," Love said. "This wasn't going to be a day for real low scores. They took the air out of the greens last night."

Of the 84 players who finished play, only 17 managed to break par.

One of them was Norman, who appreciates the cruel nature of Augusta as well as anyone. He played the final 10 holes in 2-under for a 71 -- that's particularly significant since he had played his past five rounds in a combined 23-over.

"It was a fairly stable round, a consistent round," Norman said. "I just go about my business and let everything take care of itself."

The course was playing about one stroke easier than last year, but it was missing the howling, swirling winds from the first round a year ago.

Not that everyone found it easier.

Nick Faldo, a three-time Masters champion, showed how badly his game is suffering when he played the first 15 holes without a birdie and wound up with an 80. Faldo has not broken par at Augusta since his final-round 67 to win the 1996 Masters.

Phil Mickelson had a 3-foot birdie putt on No. 13 for a share of the lead. The putt rimmed out and trouble followed -- a double bogey on No. 17, bogeys on the last two holes and a 74.

Els felt about the same way when he walked off the course. He was 3-under after a birdie on the 17th when his drive found the fairway bunker on 18, then he caught a plugged lie in the greenside bunker and three-putted.

"You can't do things like I did on 18," he said.

Woods knows the feeling. His six birdies were more than anyone today, but half of them were wasted on No. 8, where he took an eight.

He hit his drive into trees and found his ball between two pine cones, leaving him little choice but to play it straight -- and straight into a tree. The ball caromed back and into the azaleas, from where he had to take a penalty drop.

"This is how you lose a tournament," Woods muttered to himself.

The changes at Augusta were the most significant ever 0- tee boxes moved back on No. 17 and the par-5 second hole, an elevated green on No. 11, 20 new pine trees lining the fairways between No. 15 and the 17th.

Still, it always comes down to who can survive the slippery, contoured greens.

Chamblee, playing his first Masters, followed his only bogey with an eagle on the par-5 13th, and finished off his 69 by curling in a 6-foot birdie putt on the 18th. If the lead holds up, he would become the first Masters rookie to have a share of the first-round lead since Tom Lehman in 1993.

"I really don't know how the course is going to play the next two or three days," he said. "Every day is going to be a new day for me. I think I know what to expect, but I'm not really sure."

He's not the only one.