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Looking for No. 1

Lightning blasts, rain falls and the stakes rise as clubhouse leaders get a shot at their first major title.

By BOB HARIG, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published August 16, 2002

CHASKA, Minn. -- If a player wants to win his first major title, the PGA Championship seems to be the place to do it.

For a slew of supposed reasons -- easier course setups than at other majors, venues that have more of a PGA Tour feel, fields that are strictly professionals with no amateurs -- the last major each year has a recent history of producing first-time major winners.

Eleven of the past 14 PGAs have been won by players who captured their first major. The only exceptions: Tiger Woods (1999, 2000) and Nick Price (1994). And Price had made it his first major in 1992.

So it wasn't much of a surprise Thursday when the top four spots on the leaderboard at Hazeltine National Golf Club were occupied by players who haven't won one of golf's top prizes.

Jim Furyk and Fred Funk each shot 4-under-par 68 to share the clubhouse lead in the weather-delayed first round. They were followed by Justin Rose and Peter Lonard, each of whom shot 69. Between them, they have just 12 PGA Tour titles.

Furyk missed the cut at the first three major championships this year, and Funk didn't qualify for any those. Rose, who is from England and finished fourth at the 1998 British Open as an amateur, is playing his first professional event in the United States, and Lonard, an Australian who has played most of his career in Europe, is a rookie on the PGA Tour.

"I've read a number of different reasons for that, and I didn't really think any of them stood out as a great reason or a bad reason," Furyk said of first-time major winners at PGA Championships. "Everyone has an opinion, and I'm not sure what the reason is. I would like to go out and put myself in position the next couple of days, but I don't know. That history probably isn't going to help me too much."

Funk, 46, is happy to be playing in any major. He wasn't eligible for the Masters and failed to qualify for the U.S. Open and British Open.

Both players had morning tee times that were disrupted by lightning that stopped play at 8:38. Rain followed, and the round did not resume until 11:30.

The last groups of the day did not tee off until nearly 5 p.m. (EDT), and there were 39 players on the course when the round was halted at 8:19. They will finish the first round beginning at 7:30 this morning. The second round will begin at 7:45 a.m.

Trailing the foursome of first-time major hopefuls were six former major winners: two-time U.S. Open champion Lee Janzen, '97 PGA champion Davis Love and '88 PGA champ Jeff Sluman each shot 2-under 70.

Retief Goosen, who won the 2001 U.S. Open, and two-time British Open champ Greg Norman were 2 under when the round was suspended. Goosen had four holes to play, Norman three.

Tiger Woods, who won the Masters and U.S. Open this year, was in a group at 71, three strokes back. British Open champion Ernie Els shot 72.

Furyk, a U.S. Ryder Cup team member who has seven PGA Tour titles, including this year's Memorial, has had an up-and-down year. He has six top-10 finishes, but he also has missed six cuts, including all the majors. Before this year he had missed two cuts in majors in his career.

Known for his distinctive, unorthodox swing, Furyk, 32, long ago got used to trying to explain it. He defers to CBS commentator David Feherty, who has described Furyk's swing as "an octopus falling out of a tree, or a man trying to kill a snake in a phone booth."

"It certainly is unusual," said Woods, who beat Furyk last year at the NEC Invitational in a seven-hole playoff. "It is repetitive. But no one gives him enough credit for how tough he is mentally. He's tough, and everyone out here knows it. Down the stretch he is not going to make a mistake. He's as tough as nails, and he's got a great short game and putts well. His swing is a little funny looking, but it's always in play."

Perhaps karma will be on the side of Furyk, ranked 11th in the world. Since the PGA went to stroke play in 1958, the tournament has produced more first-time major-championship winners than any other major with 27.

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