Woods Opens With a Captivating 68

Tracking Tiger Woods on opening day of the Nissan Open at Riviera Country Club, where the world’s best golfer shot a three-under-par 68 that left him four shots off the lead:

It starts off as a typical day for the world’s most popular player.

At about 7:45 a.m., as Woods makes his way from the driving range up a cart path to the putting green near the hilltop clubhouse, he is suddenly surrounded by autograph-seeking fans.

One is nearly knocked off his feet by a security guard.

“Keep the pens out of his face,” barks another guard.

Clad in beige slacks, shirt and sleeveless sweater, with brown shoes and a white cap, Woods is the center of attention even before he tees off.

The rain that has soaked the course for the better part of a week has given way to a bright, brisk Thursday morning, and the several hundred fans who have shown up at this hour all seem to be here only to see Tiger.

Golf’s leading all-time money winner is playing with Ryder Cup teammates Hal Sutton, who outshot Jack Nicklaus by a stroke to win the PGA Championship on this course in 1983, and Steve Pate, a six-time PGA Tour winner and former UCLA All-American, but they might as well be invisible.

They’re bit players.

At least somebody is pretending to watch them, which can’t be said of the 141 players who are not paired with Woods.

After Woods’ threesome tees off at No. 1 shortly after 8 a.m., the fans who had lined the tee box, crowding in two and three deep behind the ropes, quickly disperse and follow the players down the fairway, leaving plenty of elbow room to watch the next group.

And when Woods’ threesome heads to the second tee after Woods taps in a short putt for birdie, the first green, surrounded by fans only a moment earlier, is suddenly the loneliest place on the course.

All day, wherever Tiger goes, the multitudes follow through the mud.

He rarely acknowledges them, keeping his focus on an opening round that teeters on the verge of greatness but ultimately comes up short because of spotty putting.

His troubles start on No. 6, where he implores his tee shot to “go in, go in--go in the hole.”

It doesn’t, stopping about 12 feet past the cup, and neither do his first two putts. After tapping in for bogey, he angrily bangs his putter on a metal sprinkler cover.

Later, as Woods bounces a ball on the head of his driver while walking from the 11th green to the 12th tee, bringing to mind the commercial in which he performs the same trick, somebody good-naturedly tells him to stop.

“It’s the only thing I can do right,” he says, smiling.

The truth is far from that.

He misses only one fairway, landing his tee shot on No. 11 between two eucalyptus trees, and leaves himself with birdie putts of 12 feet or closer on nine holes.

He ends the round with four birdies, and his three-putt on No. 6 is his only bogey of the day.

“You can’t get mad at that,” Woods says of his round, speaking to a cluster of reporters who engulf him after he made about an eight-foot putt to save par on No. 18. “It’s just that I hit the ball well enough to shoot a really good number. But I just didn’t. . . .

“I hit it well, but I lipped out probably four or five putts. There’s nothing you can do about that. . . . If it doesn’t go in, it doesn’t go in.”

Overall, he is pleased.

His six-tournament winning streak, the longest in 52 years, ended Sunday when he finished tied for second behind Phil Mickelson in the Buick Invitational at La Jolla, but he has a shot at making it seven of eight this week.

“The first day, all you’re trying to do is get yourself in position,” Woods says before heading off to the driving range to work out a few kinks. “Don’t shoot yourself in the foot with a 75 and put yourself out of it.

“I just tried to shoot under par today. Something in the 60s would have been very good, and I was able to do that.”