Golfing News

The first full field of the 2009 PGA TOUR season was greeted by alternating calm and howling winds, and sunshine and lashing rain, as the weather was the biggest story in the first round of the Sony Open in Hawaii at the Waialae Country Club on Thursday.

Gusts up to 35 m.p.h. raked the course most of the day, as the low scores that traditionally pepper the Sony leaderboard didn’t materialize. Only 38 of the 144 starters broke par. The par-4 first hole, an upwind 477-yard par-4, play to a stroke average of 4.6, while the downwind 504-yard par-5 ninth played to an average of 4.1.

Despite hitting less than half of Waialae’s narrow fairways, Japan’s Shigeki Maruyama carded 6 birdies and one bogey for a 5-under 65 that was good for a one-shot first-round lead ahead of a pack of players who shot 66. That group includes last week’s winner Geoff Ogilvy, Australia’s Nathan Green and Americans Boo Weekley, Brian Gay and Webb Simpson, the latter competing in his first ever TOUR event.

Another fivesome shot 67: Charles Howell III, Jerry Kelly, Scott Piercy, Chris Stroud and Brandon de Jonge. Defending champion K.J. Choi was among a bigger pack that shot 68.

Friday’s play will also be among the gales; a cold front is expected to bring winds upwards of 55 m.p.h. across the island of Oahu that may delay play if winds prevent golf balls from remaining still on the greens. Friday’s tee times began on time at 7:15 a.m. Hawaiian time (12:15 p.m. U.S. East Coast time).

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