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Thursday, May 23

Maruyama shoots 68 despite injuries
Associated Press

ATLANTA -- Shigeki Maruyama had no reason to think he could finish his first round at the Tour Championship, let alone break par.


	Maruyama

The Japanese star has been out the last six weeks with a shoulder injury. Once he was healthy enough to swing a club, he played Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles last week was a tuneup and injured his lower right back.

Maruyama isn't comfortable speaking English, but he explained the cure by mimicking a series of injections -- cortisone, presumably -- that left him fit enough to play.

And a new putter helped in a round of 68 Thursday.

''Couple of injections Monday night,'' he said through an interpreter.

Maruyama won the Byron Nelson Classic in May, becoming the first Japanese player to win twice on the PGA Tour.

He injured his right shoulder during the Pennsylvania Classic in early September, and has spent the rest of the time going to doctors. He feared surgery might be his only option, but now says he might be able to do without it and open the season in the Mercedes Championships.

''I had no expectations, and that helped my game,'' Maruyama said. ''I was very happy to swing with both hands.''

With the shoulder injury, he has been letting go of the club with one hand on his follow through.

Asked if the injury was frustrating, he said, ''I have stress all the time.''

Keeping busy
Retief Goosen would love to win the Tour Championship in his first attempt, but the real prize is next week.

The former U.S. Open champion is in a tight battle with Padraig Harrington on the European tour's Order of Merit.

Goosen leads by about $54,000, and the race will be decided next week at Valderrama in the season-ending Volvo Masters. Harrington is playing in the Italian Open this week, although the purse is small and he already is 10 shots out of the lead.

''I won it last year and I would love to win it again,'' Goosen said after opening with a 69 at East Lake. ''Winning any Order of Merit, being the best player in Europe, is a good achievement.''

Goosen left the Madrid Open on Monday to get to Atlanta, and he will return to Spain after the Tour Championship is over.

With so much on the line, he didn't think twice about coming across the Atlantic for only one week.

''I wanted to play here,'' he said. ''It's my first time in the Tour Championship, and I was definitely going to come. I'm going to try to do well this week. I'm not really thinking about next week.''

Goosen isn't the only guy piling up frequent flyer miles.

Steve Williams, the caddie for Tiger Woods, left the Disney World Golf Classic two weeks ago for New Zealand so he could race cars.

He won both races over the weekend, then got on a plane Monday morning and arrived in Atlanta on Monday night, a trip of about 24 hours. Williams was on the course the next morning at 7 a.m. to map out yardage.

Not a fair test
Steve Lowery shot a 60 in the pro-am at East Lake on Tuesday, but don't look for his name in the record books.

Rick Burton, the golf director at East Lake, said Lowery's score will not be recognized because it was played under the lift, clean and place rule, and because the course for the pro-am is set up easier.

Vijay Singh owns the competitive course record with a 7-under 63 in the first round of the 1998 Tour Championship.

Bryce Molder owns the course record when East Lake plays to its regular par of 72. For the Tour Championship, Nos. 5 and 10 are converted to par-4s.

Notes
Chris DiMarco went to the Atlanta Thrashers hockey game and got booed. He concluded an interview at the arena with the Florida Gator ''chomp,'' not the gesture most of the Georgia fans wanted to see. Florida and Georgia play this weekend in Jacksonville, Fla. ... Only 10 of the 30 players in the field broke par. ... Charles Howell III won't be through playing after this week. He plans to play in the Taiheiyo Masters on the Japanese tour, then the Australian Open.

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