Pebble Beach Golf Tournament : Strange Leads by 2 Shots Despite 71

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. —  On a day when a cold wind blows off the ocean and whistles rudely through the Del Monte forest, Pebble Beach Golf Links is a pretty miserable place to play golf.

But when the day is warm and sunny and the wind calm, on a day like Friday, then it becomes something entirely different.

“The prettiest place on earth,” said Tom Kite.

For the second consecutive day, the weather was good and so were the scores in the $2-million Nabisco Championships.

There was another 64 posted, this one by Mark Weibe, and Kite got close to leader Curtis Strange with a 65.

Strange kept himself slightly ahead of the pack with a 1-under-par 71, which gave him a 2-round total of 135, leaving him 2 shots in front of Kite, Ken Green and Bruce Lietzke.

It wasn’t a particularly flashy day for Strange, who had a 64 and a 3-stroke edge in the first round but came back Friday with a 2-birdie, 1-bogey round marred by an incident with a photographer on the 18th fairway.

Strange said the photographer twice shot pictures while the golfer was in his backswing. The noise distracted him, he said, but so did the number of fans who ignored marshals and filled the fairway behind Strange and playing partner Green.

Said Green: “There were a couple of hundred of them, strolling right down the fairway, having a party.”

Even though Strange wound up with a par 5 on the closing hole, saving it by 2-putting from 10 1/2 feet, he was still angry about the distraction.

“I was ready to pinch somebody’s head off,” Strange said. “It’s just insane. It was like a . . . baseball game out there.”

Green said PGA Tour official Glenn Tait had tried to restore order on the fairway.

“He came out on a cart,” Green said. “It would have been better if he had come out on a horse.”

Of course, this was a clear case of putting the cart before the horse.

As unnerving as the camera controversy was to Strange, however, something was obviously clicking for a few other golfers.

Weibe’s round was stunning, not so much because he shot the best round a day after shooting the worst, a chilling 76, but because he produced his 64 with a new putter. Weibe bought the putter for $44 Thursday night at a golf shop in nearby Monterey.

“I spent $44 to shoot 64,” Weibe said. “I would have spent more than that. I got a great deal.”

Weibe, who had a round of 61 at Tucson last week, finished his 8-birdie, no-bogey round with a 30 on the back nine that included birdie putts of 30, 5 and 20 feet on the last three holes.

Kite was amused when he heard about Weibe’s new putter.

“He only shot a 61 last week,” said Kite. “I can understand why he’d want to change. He’ll have everybody on the Monterey Peninsula in that store tonight.”

Weibe was not only good, but quick. He played his round in a speedy 2 hours 47 minutes.

“It was get on, make it, get on, make it,” Weibe said.

But for Greg Norman, Weibe’s partner, it was more miss it, miss it, miss it. Norman finished with a 76 and is last in the 30-player field at 151.

There were 25 players who broke par Friday, 9 more than Thursday. Kite eagled the par-5 sixth and birdied all 3 of the par-3 holes.

Lietzke’s 68 included a finishing birdie on No. 18, even though his drive hit a tree in the middle of the fairway. But a 3-iron and a pitching wedge put Lietzke 14 feet from the hole and he made the putt from there.

Bob Tway and Scott Verplank are 4 shots behind Strange at 139 after their rounds of 70. Weibe is another shot back, along with Chip Beck, 71-69; David Frost, 69-71, and Jay Haas, 69-71.

Strange said he was completely satisfied with his position, although he said a 2-stroke lead isn’t scaring anyone.

“Obviously, I didn’t play as well as I did yesterday,” he said. “That would be asking a little much. But 71 is not a bad score. You just feel 71 is not that good because we got perfect weather again.

“But 2 shots can go just like that,” he said, snapping his fingers.

For the second consecutive day, Green eagled the 502-yard No. 2, this time holing a bunker shot from 40 feet. Still, Green was unimpressed with his play and blamed his driver more than anything else.

“But I’m still only 2 shots back, so in my mind, those are the two best worst rounds I’ve ever played. I’m either smarter or more mature. Since I find both reasons hard to believe, I’m probably just lucky.”

Green said he just ground it out and scored decently to stay in the hunt, a trait he identified with Tom Watson.

“In this era, there was no better bad golfer than Tom Watson,” Green said.

Green paused, then said: “You have my permission to rephrase that.”