With a Tested Trio Chasing, Leader in for an Experience

Such a nice guy too.

A smile as peaceful as Rae’s Creek, a manner as light as those pimento cheese sandwiches being served around the corner.

Chris DiMarco was watching a sportscast Thursday night when he realized the network was conducting an online survey about what he would shoot Friday on the second day of the Masters.

Worried that popular opinion might unnerve him, he quickly went to bed.

Friday afternoon, he asked for the results.

Somebody told him the consensus had been 72.

“Whew,” he said. “I thought they were going to give me a 76 or over.”

He shot a 69, giving him a two-stroke lead, making it even more difficult to say what needs to be said.

Chris DiMarco is done.

He’s done because he is playing today with Tiger Woods.

While playing just behind Phil Mickelson.

Who will be playing just behind David Duval.

This tournament is called the Masters. It is not called the Rookies.

And DiMarco is surrounded.

“I’m excited, I really am,” DiMarco said.

Poor man.

The Masters doesn’t do pity. It doesn’t do pathos.

Heartwarming stories here have the attention span of a three-iron. And DiMarco’s 36 holes of fame are probably sadly up.

“When I am in a nervous situation, I’ll close my eyes and think either about my daughter [age 3] or my son [5], them running around, just to get me out of the moment of thinking about negative things,” he said.

This good father should play today’s round blindfolded.

The Masters doesn’t embrace, it engages. You don’t fawn over it, you fight it.

On a sunny second day, with the greens hardening and putts flying, that fight soaked the place like dew.

First there was Woods. Angry about Thursday’s 70 in ideal conditions, he birdied four of the first eight holes to make up for it, finishing with 66, climbing back on a leaderboard that seemed naked without him.

The other guys are just chasing a jacket. Woods is chasing history. He will make sure we don’t forget it.

Take the 13th hole Friday when, leaning over a six-foot birdie putt, he suddenly stopped.

It was a tiny bug. The beast had the nerve to fly through his line of vision. Woods stopped, swatted it away, hunched back over the putt, and sank it.

Woods has the same 36-hole score he had when he won here in 1997 with 136, putting him two behind DiMarco.

Who, of course, is already chasing Tiger.

“You’re going to see the guys who are really playing well, probably separate themselves a little bit more,” Woods said.

After Thursday’s round, he was terse and contrary.

On Friday, he smiled and chomped an apple.

We haven’t seen that grand fist pump yet. But when he birdied 18, he curled his fingers and knocked off a little one. Looked like a preview from here.

“Right now, I’m right there in the ballgame, with a great chance on the weekend,” Woods said.

Funny--or maybe not--but Mickelson said the same thing.

After knocking a ball in the water on the picturesque par-three 12th hole--accounting for a double bogey--he shrugged and put his aw-shucks routine into high gear, riding it through three birdies on the last six holes.

Tied with Woods, Mickelson is putting well enough--and Woods just erratically enough--that he could actually win a Sunday showdown.

Mickelson knows it. And he is probably the only person at Augusta National willing to stick his head into Tiger’s mouth and say it.

“There has never been a better opportunity for me to break through and win a major than right now,” Mickelson said. “This weekend provides the best opportunity for me.”

Woods is fire, Mickelson is finesse, and David Duval is, well, just plain funky.

He is recovering from a wrist injury. He is using new clubs from a new sponsor. He hasn’t played in more than a month, and hasn’t finished higher than 51st in three months.

He still wears those goofy sunglasses that, given recent weight loss, appear to be as big as his entire head.

Yet when he took the shades off late Friday, those unfamiliar eyes danced.

“I’m as jacked as can be,” Duval said. “I thought if there’s one thing I had going for me, I would be the freshest player in the field.”

Duval, you probably won’t remember, was the world’s last top-ranked player before Woods moved in permanently.

He said he is looking forward to hanging with Tiger. Mickelson said he is looking forward to hanging with Tiger. Woods said he doesn’t care who he hangs with.

And poor Chris DiMarco?

He said he was going to his rental house Friday to play with the kids.

“What a great stage,” he said. “It feels like a dream.”

That is how it felt last August to Bob May, the underdog who dueled Woods into a playoff before losing the PGA Championship. DiMarco knows about May.

“You know, we go to a normal tournament, everything is pro-Tiger,” he said. “I’m sure there will be a lot of pro-Tigers, but I think I gained a lot of fan base out there, so I’m sure I will hear a lot of, ‘Go, Chrises,’ which will be nice.”

One difference, of course.

At the PGA, both Woods and the contender were playing a strange course.

Here, only one of them is playing a strange course.

For DiMarco, this is one strange trip. For Woods and Mickelson and Duval, this is a home game.

“More than anything, I’ve been there before,” Woods said. “I know how to control my emotions and I know what to expect, what to feel, and what I’ll probably experience coming down the stretch with a chance to win.”

And of DiMarco’s inexperience?

“If you have not been there, it is tough,” Woods said.

DiMarco said he can take tough.

“This is like a dream,” he said. “You can pinch me if you want.”

Poor guy. They’re going to do a lot more to him than that.

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Bill Plaschke can be reached at his e-mail address: bill.plaschke@latimes.com.