Photo credit: Jeremy Harness

By Jeremy Harness

PEBBLE BEACH – After a week filled with rain and cloudy skies, players and spectators were treated to sunshine and a considerably-warmer weather during Thursday’s opening round.

And the players certainly took advantage of that, especially with Mother Nature set to unleash her wrath as early as tomorrow.

As is the custom for this tournament – which utilizes three courses in Pebble Beach, Monterey Peninsula Country Club and Spyglass Hill – the pros took advantage of Monterey Peninsula, considered to be the easiest course of the three to jump to the top of the leaderboard.

Six out of the eight players who found themselves at the top of the leaderboard on Thursday used Monterey Peninsula on Thursday. That included first-day co-leader Brian Gay, who blistered the course with a seven-under 64, which saw him record five birdies in a row at holes five through nine.

“It’s usually the driest of the three (courses), which is nice this week, because everything’s really wet,” Gay said. “I just like the style of it. It’s beautiful out here on the water, and I just always enjoyed it.” Tied with Gay at the top is Scott Langley, who himself got a 64 out of Monterey Peninsula. He didn’t have the best of starts, as he bogeyed his second hole of the day but quickly bounced back with a bordie on the next hole.

He went on to birdie eight more holes, including three in a row at holes 16 through 18, against only one more bogey.

Come tomorrow, both guys will play Spyglass Hill, which is considered to be the toughest of the three, particularly because of the slickness of the greens and the prevalent wind.

Phil Mickelson is another guy who has always enjoyed coming to Pebble, and it certainly showed again on Thursday.

Now he has never been known to be the most accurate driver out there, but you wouldn’t know that by watching him play the opening round of this event, as he hit each of the 14 fairways en route to a six-under 65, as he birdied seven holes against only one bogey.

“So history was made today,” Mickelson said. “To the best of my knowledge, it’s taken me 27 years and a few months to hit all fairways in a single round in a competition. I may have done it before, but I don’t even recall doing it.

“It was a really good solid round, good solid start, and we had beautiful weather, and the golf course here is in spectacular shape.”

The recovery of the day had to go to Brandt Snedeker, who pulled his drive left of the retaining wall at the par-5 18th hole at Pebble Beach, in a pebble-collection area just before reaching the water.

He then got back into the fairway on his second shot before knocking his approach onto the green. He then sank a seven-footer to make an improbable birdie on his way to a three-under 69.

Things weren’t going nearly as well for defending champion Ted Potter, Jr., however, who wasn’t doing much recovering at all. He started Thursday’s round with a triple bogey, and it did not get much better from that point. He went on to suffer two more double bogeys to go along with another bogey on the first nine, with two more doubles and a bogey on the back side for a 10-over score of 82.

NOTES: Due to the inclement weather set to arrive tomorrow, tee times have been moved up an hour early. As a result, the first tee time is scheduled for 7:00 am PST.