GOLF: Time moves on, but this time they were doing it for themselves. In the rather more sedate setting of The Grove, a country estate near Watford and a million miles away from the white-hot atmosphere which they had encountered at The K Club, when they stared each other in the eye on the first tee in the first match of the first day of the Ryder Cup a week ago, Tiger Woods and Padraig Harrington yesterday made impressive starts in pursuit of the €1 million top prize in the WGC-American Express championship.
Woods, the defending champion and winner of this title on four of the six occasions it has been staged, opened with a course record 63, eight-under, that left him with a one-shot overnight advantage over Harrington and Ian Poulter.
For Harrington, though, his bogey-free 64 - his best opening round anywhere since shooting a similar score in the 2001 Portuguese Open - was the perfect antidote to the lingering tiredness, mentally and physically, of the Ryder Cup. More importantly for the player, now that he is back in an individual frame of mind, contending in this big-money tournament is vital if he is to achieve his aspiration of topping the Order of Merit. He is currently fourth, behind Paul Casey, in the money race.
"The natural progression, the next stepping-stone for me in my career, would be to win a world golf championship event," said Harrington. "I've progressed nicely in my career all the way up so far, but I don't have any world events and I don't have any majors. If I had done everything else in a slow progression, which I tend to do, it would be an event like this that I win next. And that's a steppingstone, to then have the confidence to go on and win a major."
As such, this AmEx championship, with its €5.8 million purse, has a vital importance for Harrington. For one, he has half an eye on the Order of Merit title - "That is definitely on my mind," he said - while, secondly, this tournament also counts on the US Tour money list and he needs to break into the top-30 there if he is to claim a place in the Tour Championship. He is currently 57th in that ranking, and needs a top-two finish here if he is break into that field.
On a day when many of the protagonists from last week's Ryder Cup picked up where they had left off, Harrington, who only claimed one half-point from his five matches, maintained the sort of form he had displayed before The K Club. His two tournaments prior to the Ryder Cup saw him finish second and fourth in Munich and Madrid respectively, and yesterday he hit 15 of 18 greens in regulation in a round that included only 27 putts.
"Last week I had a steady, average week, especially on the greens. I didn't hole anything. I would have said this form was more indicative of the BMW (in Munich) and the Madrid tournament," said Harrington, whose putting drill on Wednesday, when he spent a considerable amount of time on the practice green with his left shoe off so that it encouraged him to lean on his left side, obviously worked a dream.
Harrington set out his aggressive intent from the start yesterday, driving over the back of the first hole, a dog-leg par four of 379 yards. He pitched to two feet, and sank the putt. On the second, he chipped to eight feet and holed the putt.
"I came into here exceptionally tired. My practice round (on Wednesday) must have been the hardest 18 holes of golf I've ever had to play in terms of not wanting to be out on the golf course. I was very tired . . . (but) there's a huge difference on tournament day, and it helped starting out with a couple of birdies, that caught my interest."
The upshot was that Harrington covered the front nine in 30 strokes and, if the birdies dried up for a time on the homeward run, he grabbed birdies at each of the par fives, the 15th and 18th, to sign for a 64, which constituted his lowest opening round in five years.
Woods went one better, covering the front nine in 29 - "No, I didn't have any thoughts of 59, 58," he said - and then sank a 20-footer for eagle on the 18th, where he hit a three-wood approach of 270 yards, beautifully cutting the ball in towards the tough pin position behind the greenside bunker.
On Wednesday, Darren Clarke - who opened here with a 68, three-under - had hosted a birthday party for his son Conor that that took the form of a visit to the zoo with monkeys, snakes and centipedes among the creatures in attendance. Yesterday, he was playing alongside Woods, who was utterly relaxed in the Ulsterman's company.
"You know, it's always fun playing with Darren, no matter what. We had a great time playing against each other in the Ryder Cup and any time we play practice rounds or we play in competition we're always needling each other the entire day. It was fun."
But Woods could also stay focused on the more serious side of compiling a score that has him in pole position to claim a sixth straight strokeplay event.
