by Jeff Skinner
It was an adventurous day at the 114th U.S Open at Pinehurst, for me and the players. I finally got a chance to see the restoration and it didn’t disappoint. It’s an impressive course even from outside the rope.
For most of the day it looked like one or two under would hold up for the lead but Martin Kaymer, who just went through his own “restoration” project, pulled away from the field for a thee stroke lead after day one.
Kaymer’s 5 under 65 is the lowest U.S. Open round ever shot ay Pinehurst No.2. Kaymer won The PLAYERS earlier this year and is certainly a surprise leader.
Fran Quinn, Brandon DeJonge, Graeme McDowell and Kevin Na are all three strokes back and tied for second.
As far as the course it played to a scoring average of 73.23 which was the lowest first round score since 2003. From this hacker’s point of view it looked tougher than that, I spent time around number three, five, fifteen, twelve and I saw a lot more bogeys than I did birdies.
The par 4 eleventh came in as the toughest hole at 4.47 average and the par 5 fifth was the only hole to lay under par for the day.
Mike McAllister tells us that no player has ever pulled off The PLAYERS and The Open Double.
The boys at Golf Digest give us their Birdies & Bogeys.
And here is the Day in GIF’s from GD.
Jeff Babineau of Golf Week says Phil’s putter wasn’t what it should be…and Phil knew it.
Golf.com has a great slideshow of the day’s action.
Here’s Steve DiMeglio’s game story in USA Today.
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