Eaks Makes History With Record Round, Leads Watson

Play Suspended Until Friday Morning

By Ken Klavon, USGA

Baltimore, Md. – Fifty, when applied to age, can be construed as a dirty word to some. Not to R.W. Eaks. He couldn’t wait to flip the biological odometer.

“The only people that don’t want to be 50 are the guys that are 49,” said Eaks, after sitting atop the Senior Open first-round leaderboard with a sizzling 7-under 64 at Caves Valley Golf Club on Thursday.

“I waited three years to turn 50 because in August of 1998 when I was on the [PGA] Tour, I was probably playing the best golf I’ve ever played.”

Eaks, a rookie on the Senior PGA Tour, tied a first-round record with his score. Orville Moody (1989), Bruce Fleisher (2000) and Jay Sigel (2001) all shot first-round 64s.

In addition, Eaks broke the course record that was set by John Harris in the 1995 Mid-Amateur. Harris had shot a 67. All this despite Eaks hitting 57.1 percent of his fairways.

Only five players have ever won a Senior Open on their first attempt. “I’d like to be No. 6,” said Eaks.

Tom Watson, a winner of eight majors, was in second at 4-under 68. James Mason, a teaching pro from Georgia, shot a 3-under 68. Last year’s second-place finisher, Isao Aoki, was at 2 under. So were Jim Ahern and Fred Gibson.

Aoki would have been in second if not for a horrendous showing on No. 18, which he triple-bogeyed.

Play was suspended at 6:31 p.m. EDT with 10 groups on the course. Up until that point, 13 players were under par. Nine of those had already finished.

The completion of the first round will start at 7:45 a.m.; the second round will begin off the first and 10^th tees, at 7:15 a.m., as scheduled.

Though it’s still early, if Eaks could hold on he would become the youngest player to win a Senior Open. He would surpass 1986 winner Dale Douglass, who was three months, 24 days past his 50^th birthday. Eaks turned 50 on May 22.

The five players who have won Senior Opens in their first attempt are Roberto Devicenzo (1980); Arnold Palmer (1981); Douglass (1986); Lee Trevino (1990); and Larry Laoretti in 1992.

“I’ve never looked at the records for the Senior Open or anything like that,” said Eaks. “I’m kind of disappointed I didn’t shoot 63, actually.”

Appearing in 258 Buy.com events -- the second most ever behind Steve Haskins’ 292 – then joining the PGA Tour full-time in 1998, Eaks hasn’t won on the Senior Tour this year.

Three years ago when he felt his game peaking, he fell into a bunker on No. 16 at Quad Cities and blew out his right hip.

He never thought about quitting.

“No, not really,” he said. “Sometimes you get done with a tournament and you go, ‘Man, I don’t know if I can play this anymore,’ and take a day or two off and all of a sudden you’re ready to go again.”

He went off like a cannon ball on Thursday morning. Starting on the back nine, he carded back-to-back birdies on 11 and 12.

By the time he made the turn onto the front nine, he was 4 under. On No. 3, his 12^th hole of the round, he hit a “target-like drive” before pulling his 6-iron out. He pushed the ball to 14 feet and it rolled in for an eagle.

“You know, I got to 8 under par and started thinking, ‘Man, maybe I can shoot 59 today,’” said Eaks.  

Said playing partner, amateur Paul Simpson, who shot a 1-under 70: “I was just kind of hanging on to his coattails as best as I could. … If it was a [Jack] Nicklaus or Watson or something, and we had a huge gallery, it would be a little distracting because they tend to feed off those premier players.”

Speaking of Watson, the 1982 U.S. Open champ was a model of consistency. Playing in a group with Thorpe and Fuzzy Zoeller, Watson was the brightest star. He began on the front, mixing in one birdie with eight pars.

He had a number of notable save-par putts, but his most remarkable sequence may have been on No. 6, a 462-yard par 4, where he got up and down beautifully, actually settling for par with an 8-foot putt.

On the back nine, with the wind picking up, he notched three more birdies. The most satisfying one occurred on the 330-yard par-4 14^th. Before chipping in, Watson hit a 2-iron into the left short rough. Then he watched his sand wedge get smothered by deep fringe rough.

“But I had a perfect lie,” said Watson. “It was like it was teed up. And I said, ‘Well, look here.’”

He didn’t record any bogeys. The strength of his round, however, was the number of fairways hit (85.7 percent).

“I was good off the tee, and that sets up any round of golf,” said Watson.

Mason’s story is one of the more interesting ones this week. Prior to the season he told himself he’d commit to 30 Monday qualifiers this year. If he didn’t do well in those, he’d seriously consider giving up the Senior Tour dream.

After making it into the NFL Golf Classic earlier this month off one of those Monday qualifiers, he won the event. With that victory, he became just the eighth Monday qualifier to ever win a Senior Tour tournament.

The victory at the NFL Classic earned him a one-year exemption on the tour.

“I was about, what, halfway through them? So I was certainly dedicated to the whole year,” said Mason.

He spent roughly $1,000 per week at each qualifier, mostly using credit cards to offset the expense.

The victory at the NFL Classic “helped me pay off my bills,” he said.

Mason sprinkled six birdies and a near hole-in-one into his round, although he did double bogey No. 6, a 462-yard par 4.

Then on the 196-yard par-3 No. 8, Mason stroked a 6-iron into a left-blowing wind. The ball hopped on and stopped about 2 inches from the hole. “The gallery down there let me know it was right close,” said Mason.

Overall, the 28 putts he took pleased him.

“My expectations are to keep my name on the leaderboard and hope I’m there on Sunday,” said Mason.

With rain pelting the course, there’s no doubt it will soften the greens, which have registered 12 to 12 ½ on the stimpmeter. They’re fast in most places, especially those holes with a shelf or shaped like a turtle shell.

“It just takes a while to learn these greens,” said Bob Gilder, who shot even par.

Said Thorpe: “Some greens were like glass [today]. Some of the down-sloping greens, you just touched it and it goes and goes.”

Watson said the course played shorter, mainly because the heat wasn’t as oppressive as it was during the practice rounds.

“There’s nothing wrong with the course,” said Zoeller, who shot 1-over 72. “The wind swirled up on the back nine. We had a downwind on 10, 11 and 12, then on 13 it was in our face.”

Arnold Palmer, the 1981 Senior Open winner, shot an 11-over 82.

“I got a little greedy today,” said Palmer. “My driving wasn’t good.”

Ken Klavon is the USGA Web Editor. E-mail him at kklavon@usga.org.