Rd. 1: Shell Houston Open
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PLAY CALLED FOR THE DAY (4:00 p.m.): It's official -- today's play at the Shell Houston Open has been called due to high winds in the area. The first round will resume at 8 a.m. local time tomorrow.
With winds blowing over 35 mph and the greens shaved down to mimic Augusta National, several players' balls were unable to hold their position on the green, causing officials to suspend and eventually call play with the wind not expected to die down until tonight. There's also an area wind advisory until 7 p.m.
"We just couldn't conduct the competition so we had to call it," Mark Russell, the PGA TOUR's Vice President of Rules, told GOLF CHANNEL.
What about if this was a regular TOUR event with slower greens? "I doubt it," Rusell continued. "Once the wind gets over 40 mph, it's very difficult to play. If we had known the wind was going to blow like this, we wouldn't have Stimped the greens that way."
With the greens rolling close to 14 on the Stimpmeter, and several shaved areas around the greens, the putting surfaces were just too slippery. The wind is expected to die down tonight with winds at just 10 mph tomorrow.
With roughly half the field yet to even tee off, they'll be playing catch-up all weekend with the cut expected to come late Saturday afternoon or early Sunday morning. "We're going to do everything we can to finish by 5 p.m. Sunday," Russell said. -- Brian Wacker
A MOMENT WITH MICKELSON (3:40 p.m.): Phil Mickelson surprised Rice School science teacher Amanda Santana Wednesday morning. Mickelson went to the Houston Independent School District magnate school to tell Santana she had been selected to attend this summer's Mickelson Exxon Mobil Teachers Academy at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, N.J.
"Education is critical, but especially in the math and sciences," said Mickelson told the Houston Chronicle. "The students who are here today are going to be the ones that are solving many of the world's problems, and they need a solid foundation in math and science."
Mickelson made the announcement at an assembly. He and Santana demonstrated the classic egg-drop experiment before Santana picked a student -- fourth-grader Sam Golden -- to join Mickelson for a lesson on how he uses science to improve his putts. -- Melanie Hauser
DELAY CITY (3:00 p.m.): The Shell Houston Open isn't the only tournament enduring a delay today. Earlier, the Nationwide Tour's Stonebrae Classic was delayed because of fog. That's not exactly a surprise considering they're playing in San Francisco, but the fog has since lifted and play is under way from the two-year-old TPC San Francisco. To follow that action live,click here. -- Brian Wacker
GONE WITH THE WIND (2:30 p.m.): Call it gone with the wind -- Shell Houston Open style.
Play was suspended at 12:50 p.m. local time Thursday due to a front blasting through with winds gusting to 35 mph -- and there's an area wind advisory until 7 p.m. With the greens exposed and running lightning fast, balls were moving on the greens.
Greg Norman, who teed off on the 10th hole, came out of the fairway at the 18th. His ball hit about 12 inches from the stick and rolled about 18 feet. It stayed there for about 5 minutes, then as J.B. Holmes was preparing to play his third shot into the green, Norman's ball rolled all the way down the slope, past the pin and stopped about 14 feet away -- barely on the green. The flagstick was bent so far the flag was almost touching the ground. Norman marked the ball and a few minutes later, the horn blew.
The tournament had already been delayed more than two hours Thursday morning when two lines of rainstorms blew through the area.
The last time a tournament was delayed by wind was during the fourth round of the 2007 Verizon Heritage. Play at Pebble Beach earlier this year was delayed by wind and rain.
Although winds blew steadier and harder at last year's British Open at Birkdale, the greens were not as exposed and it was damp. -- Melanie Hauser
WEATHER DELAY (2:10 p.m.): Play has been suspended at the Shell Houston Open, where rain already delayed the start of play earlier this morning. That'll mean playing catch-up tomorrow since they won't be able to complete the entire first round today. Stay tuned. -- Brian Wacker
WESTWOOD IN CHARGE (1:45 p.m.): Lee Westwood has climbed to the top of the leaderboard thanks to a 4-under 32 on the front nine at Redstone. The Englishman, who has two top 10s on the European Tour this season, including a T7 at the Johnnie Walker Championship in February, is looking for his first win on the PGA TOUR since 1998, which is hard to figure given his success around the world and in the Ryder Cup, where he's had some big wins over the years. Of course, he's had plenty of opportunities -- last year's U.S. Open among them.
As for today, all of his birdies have come from beyond 10 feet, including a 44-foot, 7-inch bomb on the 238-yard, par-3 ninth. Even though he hasn't left himself any short putts, Westwood's ballstriking has been better than solid with him hitting 75 percent of his fairways and 90 percent of his greens in regulation. He's also averaging just 1.55 putts. -- Brian Wacker
MASTERS DOCTOR? (1:20 p.m.): Rees Jones has long been considered the Open doctor for his work on a number of courses over the years to toughen them up to U.S. Open standards. This week, he's more like a Masters doctor, having been the creator of Houston's Redstone Golf Club.
"Actually we didn't have Augusta National in mind," Jones said yesterday. "Although to some degree my training from my father, Robert Trent Jones, he always had Augusta National in mind, and I think I learned a lot about green contours and Bobby Jones' philosophy.
"My dad did the 16th hole and the 11th hole and 13th green at Augusta. Then he built Peach Tree with Bobby Jones, which is much like Redstone. So to some degree, it was good fortune maybe that they hired me because I sort of had that philosophy, the strategic layout of Augusta National." -- Brian Wacker
HAAS OUT FAST (1:00 p.m.): Bill Haas is still looking for career victory No. 1 and for the moment he's off to a good start in Houston with birdies on three of his last five holes to get to 3 under on the day.
After a stellar amateur career at Wake Forest, Haas hasn't had quite the start to his career that he or others expected. Haas does have a career-best T3 at the 2007 Viking Classic under his belt, but he's also made just 53 of 91 cuts each of the last three years prior to this season. This year hasn't been much different for Haas, who's missed four of nine cuts with a season-best finish of T9 at the Sony Open in Hawaii. -- Brian Wacker
PADDY'S FAST START (12:35 p.m.): It looks like Padraig Harrington's confidence in his game is pretty good right now after a 2-under start through his first three holes. That's what a couple of early birdies will do.
Harrington, who started on the back nine at Redstone, rolled in a 19 footer for birdie on No. 11 then added another one hole later after hitting his approach to 3 feet. You can follow Harrington's round live, shot by shot, with Shot Tracker by clicking here. -- Brian Wacker
SERGIO'S APPEARANCE (12:15 p.m.): Sergio Garcia is playing in the Shell Houston Open for the first time in his career. But not because he has a historically good record in Texas. Like a lot of other big-name players, Garcia is gearing up for the Masters. Obviously the folks at Redstone were smart to try to make their course as much like Augusta National as possible.
"I heard that the golf course was really nice, that they tried to prepare it as close to what we might find at Augusta," Garcia said. "I wanted to change the way I got into the Masters. Unfortunately, I haven't done great there in the past probably four years, so I wanted to change that.
"Instead of taking one, two weeks off before that, I wanted to play the week before and see if I could get some momentum going into there."
He'll need it. Garcia has only played three tournaments in the U.S. this season and only once did he finish in the top 30 with a T13 at The Honda Classic. Garcia will tee off at 3:30 p.m. today with Vijay Singh -- another player who is looking to dial-in his game here in Houston -- and Henrik Stenson. -- Brian Wacker
LEADERBOARD CHECK (11:50 a.m.): Lee Westwood is your early leader at 2 under after birdies on each of the first two holes at Redstone Golf Club.
Alvaro Quiros, on the other hand, got off to a shakier start. The long-hitting Spaniard is 4 over through four holes after a bogey at the first and a double on No. 2, where his third shot failed to make it out of a greenside bunker. His next shot landed a little less than 13 feet from the pin and he two-putted from there. So much for Quiros, who won on the European Tour earlier this year, as one of our sleeper picks. -- Brian Wacker
FEELING CONFIDENT (11:30 a.m.): After what was a somewhat slow start to the year for Padraig Harrington, the winner of the last two majors is finally feeling good about his game as he readies for the Masters at this week's Shell Houston Open. Or is he?
Coming off a T11 at Bay Hill last week, Harrington admitted that he wasn't exactly where he wanted to be prior to that, especially mentally.
"I did plenty of work during the winter as I normally do and it dragged a little bit into the season and I got caught up a little in working on my swing for quite a few weeks," said Harrington, who also spent part of yesterday appearing on ESPN's Pardon the Interruption. "I'm not quite as competitive as I would like to have been."
Indeed. Outside of his T11 last week, Harrington has just one top 20 and two missed cuts in six PGA TOUR events.
"I'm fully hoping I walk on the tee [today] and and it's perfect," Harrington said. "By that, I'm standing and I agree with my caddy to hit a smooth 6-iron. When I go to hit it, I hit it hard or normal. I don't commit to what I decided, if you know what I mean, or, you know what, I'm not quite sure -- I don't trust the club that I picked even though it's the best choice, I'm not quite trusting it."
That's not exactly the feeling you want to have when you're trying to win the third leg of a Paddy Slam.
That said, Harrington does feel a little better now about his game than he had to this point, which is understandable.
"I'm happy enough with my game. I'm obviously working on trying to peak for next week," Harrington said. "I realize if I'm going to peak next week, I've got to show some signs of it this week. I'm hoping that the form will be good enough this week that will get me into contention.
"I could definitely do with the feeling of being in contention and having that little bit of pressure." -- Brian Wacker
EYES ON AUGUSTA (11:15 a.m.): Davis Love III and Augusta, Ga., native Charles Howell III have essentially become the poster boys for all the players bidding to win the Shell Houston Open and earn a spot in next week's Masters.
Love missed the cut at the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by MasterCard last week and therefore slipped out of the top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking -- which would have earned him an invitation. Howell, who grew up playing Augusta Country Club, which is adjacent to Amen Corner, isn't eligible yet for the first time since 2002.
However, those are just two of 107 players in the field at Redstone looking for the last spot in the first major of the season. So while 12 of the top 15 players in the world have come to Houston to make sure their games are in tip-top shape, there's another interesting storyline to follow this week.
The players already qualified to play at Augusta National are: Stuart Appleby, Aaron Baddeley, Briny Baird, Angel Cabrera, Chad Campbell, Paul Casey, K.J. Choi, Fred Couples, Ben Curtis, Luke Donald, Ernie Els, Sergio Garcia, Padraig Harrington, Dudley Hart, Dustin Johnson, Robert Karlsson, Martin Kaymer, Anthony Kim, Justin Leonard, Hunter Mahan, Billy Mayfair, Rory McIlroy, John Merrick, Phil Mickelson, Greg Norman, Geoff Ogilvy, Alvaro Quiros, Chez Reavie, Andres Romero, Justin Rose, Jeev Singh, Vijay Singh, Henrik Stenson, Steve Stricker, Kevin Sutherland, Camilo Villegas and Lee Westwood. -- Helen Ross
PREPPING FOR THE MASTERS (10:45 a.m.): Many players have come to play in the Shell Houston Open because tournament officials have tried to create an Augusta National-like feel at Redstone Golf Club with tight lies, shaved banks and greens running 12-plus on the Stimpmeter.
Stewart Cink, though, had other ideas. He lives in Duluth, Ga., which is about 2 1/2 hours from Augusta. So he picked Thursday to drive his new truck down I-20 and play a practice round at Augusta National. Not the best of decisions, judging from his latest Twitter post.
"Watchin it rain at AN. Lightning delay lifted around 9:30 but still coming down pretty hard. Lucky to get it in today, it appears," Cink said earlier this morning on his Twitter feed, twitter.com/stewartcink. -- Helen Ross
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