Ben Bates, a veteran of the Nike Tour and the sanitation business, tied the Brown Deer Park course record with a 62 today and held a two-shot lead after the first round of the Greater Milwaukee Open.

Ideal playing conditions and a streak of exceptional putting helped Bates's 9-under-par round. Mark Calcavecchia and Tom Pernice Jr. finished at 7-under, with a group of seven golfers at 6-under.

Bates was a 37-year-old rookie on the PGA Tour last season after 13 years in golf's minor leagues. He quit the game for two years to work in recycling, and spent the previous eight years on the Nike Tour.

"I told the guys I felt like Tiger Woods out there today," Bates said in his first visit to a PGA Tour interview room. "Those things don't happen to me. You watch guys like (Woods) and David Duval on TV, and even with their bad shots, something good happens. That's what it was like.''

It was like that for the dozens of players who capitalized on a forgiving public course in top condition to shoot below-par scores.

"Everybody out there was hitting fairways and greens all day," said Joey Sindelar, who had a 65 while playing in the first group of the day. "It was an easy front nine ... and a pretty easy back nine."

Woods, Duval and most of golf's biggest names skipped the GMO, which was moved this year from the Labor Day weekend to the week before the British Open. Journeymen like Bates make up much of the Milwaukee field.

"This is a tournament that one of the lesser-known guys should win," Bates said. "This is a great opportunity for those of us who have been struggling lately.''

Bates admittedly has neither the power nor the skill to continually play among golf's elite. After a 34-putt round last Saturday in the Western Open, Bates gave his putter to a boy in the crowd.

"I said, 'Good luck. Hope you're better with it than I am,' " Bates said.

Clubmaker Odyssey sent him a new putter, which he saw for the first time in his locker this morning. He then used it to hole four putts longer than 25 feet.

"And I still had three putts that lipped in and out," Bates said with a chuckle. "As good as my round was, you hate to complain, but it could have been better."

He also got a little luck on the 11th hole, when his approach shot hit some rocks near the water -- and bounded onto the green. Bates's 62 matched the course record shared by Nolan Henke, Loren Roberts and Chris Perry.

Calcavecchia is another golfer sorely in need of luck, both in his overall game and at Milwaukee. He has won over $350,000 in Milwaukee since 1981, the most by any player who hasn't won the tournament.

Calcavecchia has played in the last 19 GMOs, and by now he's fairly familiar with Brown Deer, where the tournament has been held since 1994. Today, he fired a 64 -- his 11th straight below-par round on the course.

"This is a confidence-building place for me for some reason," he said. "A couple of 64s will mend a lot of bad shots."

The 1989 British Open champion is in what he calls his worst season on tour. Already this year he has tossed one putter into a lake and snapped another, forcing him to finish a round of the GTE Byron Nelson Classic using a long iron on the greens.

"I just putted terribly two weeks ago at Westchester," he said. "I didn't touch a club for eight days, and then I come here and I'm hitting good shots again."

Defending champion Jeff Sluman struggled on the back nine and finished with an even-par 71. Tom Lehman, a last-minute GMO entry in his quest for Ryder Cup points, was six strokes behind Bates with a 68.

The last time a first-round GMO leader went on to win was in 1989, when Greg Norman did it. With his improved putting stroke, Bates is allowing himself to dream.

"When you're out there every week fighting for your tour card, just being here after the first day is great," he said.

AP