The story line was set, the 2005 Buick Invitational would be the first time the fantastic four of Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, Ernie Els, and Phil Mickelson all competed in the same tournament this year. Now, with the first round of the tournament in the books, the big four underachieved to a combined 11-under par. Today, it was 2006 Ryder Cup Captain Tom Lehman who has jumped out to an early one-stroke lead after firing a red hot 10-under 62 on the North Course at Torrey Pines. Lehman’s 62 tied his career low and included birdies on nine of his last twelve holes. Lehman said, “I’m doing a lot of things right that you need to do right out here.” Lehman was followed by Dean Wilson at 9-under par and Aaron Oberholser at 8-under par.
The final leaderboard for the day proved the dichotomy in difficulty between the North and South courses. The North course played much easier, with all but two of the top seventeen scores coming from the 6800-yard North course. There was almost three shots difference between the scoring averages of the two courses with the North course at 69.56 while the South course was at 72.43.
How did the big four fare? Ernie Els was the only one to play the North course and took advantage of it, shooting 7-under par. Tiger Woods, who is admittedly weak and still recovering from the flu, battled his way to 3-under par on the South course. Vijay Singh was 1-under par while Phil Mickelson shot an even 72.
With Tiger, Vijay, and Phil ready to play the North Course along with Aaron Baddeley, who will step onto the North course just four shots off the lead, it will be interesting to see how the leaderboard will shift for the rest of the tournament.