Wind Means Hope Classic Is No Picnic

They started the Bob Hope Chrysler Classic golf tournament and a deli broke out.

History and menus have taught us that as far as sandwiches go, there is the usual fare--the popular bacon, lettuce and tomato, and the hot pastrami. But a new variety might have been introduced Wednesday in the first round at Tamarisk.

“The 67 tuna fish,” Mark Calcavecchia said.

The what?

Calcavecchia and Jay Don Blake split a tuna sandwich halfway through their round at Tamarisk and then went on to shoot 67s, which put them one shot out of the lead, along with Donnie Hammond, who also played Tamarisk.

Mark Brooks, playing at Bermuda Dunes, and Brian Kamm, playing at Indian Wells, managed to coax 66s out of a windy day in the desert, when gusts up to 40 mph turned more than a few shots into adventures.

“It was a tough day to play golf, I’ll tell you that,” Kamm said.

Right, but in the late afternoon, when the wind was trying to blow golf balls to Indio, Kamm finished with a shot that couldn’t have been any more accurate if he had driven it to the hole in a cart.

Kamm knocked a six-iron 1 1/2 feet from the hole from 204 yards, then rolled in the putt for an eagle three.

At 5 feet 6, Kamm is the shortest player on the PGA Tour, which may make him more wind resistant than the others, although he isn’t sure how that works.

“I don’t have any proof of that,” he said.

There was no doubt, however, that the wind affected the first-round scores, which were higher than the clouds being blown over the tops of the San Jacinto Mountains.

The 66s by Brooks and Kamm matched the highest score to lead the first round in 11 years. The worst place to play was Indian Ridge, the host course, where no one broke 70 and only five broke par. It’s the same track where Kenny Perry shot a 63 last year.

You can blame it on the wind.

“It kicked in pretty fierce,” Calcavecchia said.

Actually, Calcavecchia was playing well enough. He had five birdies in a bogey-free round and recognized its contrast to how he had played last week at Tucson.

“I wasn’t doing anything well there,” said Calcavecchia, who missed the cut.

Could it have been the tuna sandwich? If so, Calcavecchia knows where it’s probably going to lead.

“Everybody will be running to the sandwich bar to the left of No. 10 to get a tuna sandwich,” he said.

Blake said his biggest problem was slow play. He had to wait for three groups before starting the second nine. He wasn’t sure how to fill his time. Finally, he came up with a plan.

“We just made a few jokes, waited around, sat on the ice chest,” he said. “After the sandwich, I had a Coca-Cola. I had a little picnic.”

How pleasant. It’s nice to know someone had a picnic on the golf course Wednesday.

Brooks had to play three of the par-five holes at Bermuda Dunes into the wind.

“The wind ate up a lot of real estate,” he said. “It was blowing.”

Kamm didn’t mind. He had worked on his swing in front of a mirror in his hotel room Tuesday night. The results were impressive, even if unexpected.

“It changes every day,” Kamm said. “Who knows what’s coming up tomorrow?”

*

Mary Bell, 70, of Palm Desert, the first woman to enter the Hope, was part of a team that shot nine under par Wednesday.

“I played great,” she said.

She almost didn’t get the chance.

Bell, a member at Bermuda Dunes, had to have the membership transferred from her husband’s name to satisfy entry requirements, had to pay a higher fee of $9,500 because of an application mix-up and had to play from the blue tees, but she persevered.

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Bob Hope Leaders

Leaders after the first round of the $1.3-million Bob Hope Classic.

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Mark Brooks 66 Brian Kamm 66 Donnie Hammond 67 Jay Don Blake 67 Mark Calcavecchia 67 Lee Rinker 68 Tom Kite 68 Fulton Allem 68 Mike Springer 68 Jay Haas 68

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* FIRST ROUND: High winds produced high scores, but Mark Brooks and Brian Kamm managed to shoot 66s for the first-round lead. C3.

* COMPLETE SCORES: C9.