Golf Roundup : Halldorson Remains Hot, Leads Heritage With 66

Canadian Dan Halldorson, barely keeping pace with his 1986 bills until last week, continued his comeback Thursday with a five-under-par 66 and a one-stroke lead over Roger Maltbie in the first round of the $450,000 Heritage golf tournament at Hilton Head Island, S.C.

The top two money leaders on this year’s PGA Tour, John Mahaffey and Calvin Peete, both withdrew with back injuries before the start of the tournament on the Harbourtown Golf Links.

Halldorson, 34, missed the cut in seven of his first nine tournaments this year and had earned just $4,610 entering last week’s Deposit Guaranty tournament at Hattiesburg, Miss. He got $36,000 for winning that event--for players who didn’t qualify for the Masters--and began his Heritage round as the first man out at 7:15 a.m.

With minimal winds to battle, the nine-year tour veteran opened with birdies of 15 and 12 feet on the first two holes. A 60-foot eagle 3 at the fifth hole dropped the Brandon, Manitoba, resident to four under par at the turn. After a three-foot birdie putt at No. 13, Halldorson’s poor drive off the 15th tee led to a bogey 6. He then ended his round with a four-foot birdie putt at No. 18.

“I made my first bogey in 63 holes at No. 15, but I played very well in my irons game,” said Halldorson. “I’ve been playing very poorly for the past 2 1/2 months until last week. I kept on working and working at my game and even got a new putter, and it looks like it’s starting to pay off. I was starting to wonder for a while whether my game was ever going to get better.”

Maltbie reeled off five straight birdies beginning at No. 2, but he bogeyed two of the next three holes to make the turn in a three-under-par 33. Two birdies on the back side offset a bogey at No. 15 and left Maltbie at 67, one shot in front of 1983 Heritage champion Fuzzy Zoeller.

Scott Hoch, Andy Bean, Russ Cochran, Curtis Strange, Joey Sindelar, Ray Floyd, Pat Lindsey and Don Pooley were included in the group at 69.

At Cannes, France, Severiano Ballesteros of Spain shot a two-under-par 70 in the first round of the $150,000 Cannes Open, then said he had been badly treated at the Masters last week.

Ballesteros, who finished fourth in the Masters at Augusta, Ga., two strokes behind winner Jack Nicklaus, said he had not received due recognition for his golf there.

“Tom Kite got credit. Greg Norman got credit. But I was the only player in contention all through and I got none,” he said.

“People always try to hit out at No. 1. It’s not just in the United States that it happens to me. I’ve had the same treatment in Britain and back home in Spain, as well.”

Ballesteros said he recognized that in his position he could identify with the United States, which faces the same problems. “They are the No. 1 country, so a lot of people try to knock them down,” he said.