ARDMORE, Pa.— Tiger Woods has always said the U.S. Open is a grind. Now he has to grind through pain, as well.
The three-time Open winner found a way to keep himself in contention on Friday by finishing up his first two rounds at 3-over, four shots behind the clubhouse leader Billy Horschel. Since early Thursday, he had been openly battling a left elbow injury, one that he is downplaying but that is clearly making him uncomfortable.
He admitted that he hurt the elbow at the Players Championship in early May, with his only competition between now and then being the Memorial two weeks ago, when he finished in 65th place at 8-over.
“It is what it is,” Woods said when asked if the elbow was any better Friday than Thursday, when his round was halted with him looking at a par putt on the 11th green.
That’s where he started at 7:13 a.m. Friday morning, from which he came in and wrapped his first round with a 3-over 73. Just about an hour after finishing, he teed off for his second round, and was hot and cold in making three birdies and three bogies for an even-par 70.
“Long day and I’m hungry,” Woods said. “I played well. I just made a couple of mistakes out there today, but I really played well. Maybe I could have gotten one or two more out of it, but it was a pretty good day.”
Notah Begay, Woods’ longtime friend and former Stanford teammate, said on NBC that Woods’ problem was in the elbow. Begay said Woods had ice and electrical stimulation treatments Thursday night.
Phil Mickelson’s 3-under 67 remained the standard when the first round was completed Friday morning, and the nasty rough and hard-to-read greens at Merion Golf Club took an even bigger bite once the second round was under way.
Besides Lefty, the only player under par was Belgium’s Nicolas Colsaerts, who like Mickelson, had a late tee time after shooting 69 on Thursday.
That must-see group of Woods, Adam Scott and Rory McIlroy was at times a hard-to-watch bunch.
Masters champion Scott fell apart quickly, all but quashing any hope for a Grand Slam. He was 3 under when first-round play was suspended Thursday, but he hit a hard-luck Merion shot at No. 12: an approach that landed just short of the pin, spun backward and rolled some 75 feet to the edge of the fairway rough. He also put a tee shot out of bounds at No. 14 to complete a first-round 72, then came back after the short turnaround to post a 76 to sit at 8 over through two rounds.
McIlroy had quite the adventure, putting his drive at No. 4 onto the No. 8 fairway. Once he got back to the correct hole, he put a shot in a bunker and bogeyed the par 5. His second-round 70 left him at 3 over.
Then there was Luke Donald, who actually pulled ahead of Mickelson at 4 under with back-to-back birdies, including a chip-in at the par-3 13th during his second round. But Merion took him apart on the front nine when he bogeyed four consecutive holes, turning his number from red to black. His second-round 72 left him at even-par.
“I think everyone thought that as soon as the course got wet it was going to play easy,” Donald said between his rounds. “The scores certainly aren’t showing that. The tough holes are extremely tough.”
Coming into the Open, the question was how Merion would fare against a modern-day championship field. It last hosted this event in 1981, with the thinking that today’s golfers had outgrown the course.
Certainly, the 301-yard par-3 10th and 102-yard par-3 13th yielded their share of makeable shots, but pre-tournament concerns about scores in the low 60s seem totally unwarranted.
“This course never lets up,” defending champion Webb Simpson said after his opening round 71.
The sun came out Friday after play began in a cool drizzle that was far gentler than the storms that interrupted play twice on Thursday. The fallout from foul weather was a cramped schedule, with some players getting precious little time between rounds on a course that requires long shuttle rides to move them to and fro. It also left players and spectators spackled in mud from their shoes to their pant cuffs.
“I got no choice,” Donald said. “Just get out there, grab something quick to eat, hit a few balls and get out there.”