García Shrugs Off Aberration at Last Hole and Hopes for Error-free Weekend

You spend all but a few minutes short of five and a half hours concentrating with immaculate intensity on the job you were put on earth to do. You ride your luck, good and bad. You try to make the most of the intervals of relatively calm weather and you grit your teeth, wrap yourself in a few extra layers and attempt to minimize your losses when a squall sweeps the course. You stay in touch with your ambitions, just close enough to feel that you have a chance going into the weekend.

And then, in the very last seconds of the round, you do something so ridiculous that it seems to mock all your previous efforts. Standing almost on top of the cup on the last green, with the grandstands preparing to applaud your honest endeavors, you miss from a distance of no more than 18 inches.

Poor Sergio García. Throughout yesterday's round his enthusiasm had never waned. His golf had not always been immaculate - after beginning the day usefully positioned at two strokes over par, he fell from grace straight away by missing a putt from three feet at the 1st - but he had played some lovely stuff, straight off the tee and inventive around the greens.

So the hasty prod with which he sent the ball sliding past the hole at the 18th was utterly out of kilter with the rest of the round. And then, using the fall back position to which athletes often resort when the mind-body interface goes inexplicably and damagingly awry, he confected an elaborate explanation.

Had he rushed the shot? "No, I didn't rush it," he retorted. "Obviously I was more worried about things other than the putt itself. That's what happens sometimes. You worry about not stepping on somebody's line or whether you should mark your ball or not and, when you put your head up, you realize you've missed it. But it's OK. We're still alive."

For most of the morning it had been a pleasure to wade through the soaking long rough in pursuit of the pre-tournament favorite. Fortunate with the conditions on Thursday, when he missed the black gale that blighted the rounds of those fated to play in the morning, García stood to benefit from yesterday's reversed draw, when the best of the weather was expected before lunchtime.

Setting apart that opening blemish, he played the front nine with composure and controlled aggression. He recovered the dropped shot as early as the par-three 4th, rolling in a glorious curving putt after misjudging his length off the tee and ending up almost 50ft past the hole. Not even that spectacular effort, however, was as exhilarating as his conquest of the 6th hole, the notorious 499-yard par four which turns sharply into the prevailing wind.

The gale was getting up as he prepared to capitalize on an excellent drive which left him perfectly positioned, looking down the gunbarrel-straight approach to the distant raised green. A two-iron went whistling under the wind to within 50ft of the flag, and a firm uphill putt put him in position to sink a satisfying five-footer. So far this week that sort of resolute, almost dispassionate par-making has represented the highest form of golfing achievement and anyone who could keep it up was going to look like a potential Open champion.

García's moment of doubt and pain came immediately after he reached the turn, still two over. At the 10th he found sand off the tee, flipped a wedge to within eight feet and then left his par putt six inches short. At the next hole a poor second shot prefaced an approach that ran 20 feet past the pin, leading to three putts and the loss of two further strokes.

He steadied himself and headed for home with a run of five excellent pars which gave way to the mixed fortunes experienced on the final pair of holes, leaving him at five over for the round.

"Today I was hitting the ball well on the front nine," he said. "With the way I was feeling and the weather conditions being a little bit better, I thought I could get it somewhere around two over for the tournament if I kept playing well. Obviously the 10th and 11th bothered me a bit and it took me a little while to get over it. And when I finally made a birdie at the 17th, I went and screwed up. But other than that I feel like we still have a good chance. We've just got to make sure we don't make any mistakes over the weekend."

Coming into a Tiger-free tournament on the back of an invigorating victory in the Players Championship, the so-called fifth major, at Sawgrass, García might have preferred to make a more authoritative statement in the opening rounds here as he attempted to write the latest chapter in Spain's summer of sporting success. In such an unpredictable tournament, however, coming into the weekend under the radar might not be such a bad notion. "This," he promised, "is far from over."