It's Spanish Riviera for Jimenez (66)

By MIKE PENNER

Feb. 24, 2001 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

After 36 years on the planet, the last 19 spent paying the bills on golf courses from Belgium to the Netherlands to his native Spain, Miguel Angel Jimenez chose to leave his safe European home for a midlife flirtation with the PGA Tour.

So in January, shortly after turning 37, Jimenez stepped up to the PGA Tour and it nearly returned him to sender. A tie for 60th place at the Phoenix Open. Back-to-back missed cuts at Pebble Beach and the Buick Invitational.

It felt, Jimenez says, like “the hole was moving. I was hitting it, and the hole is moving.” And when the hole is moving, Jimenez notes, “it is very difficult.”

Finally, Jimenez steadied himself at last week’s Bob Hope Chrysler Classic, shooting 23 under for the tournament. And through two rounds of the Nissan Open at Riviera Country Club, Jimenez has halted the motion sickness entirely, shooting a five-under 66 Friday for a share of the midway lead at seven-under 135 with Davis Love III.

Five players--Brandel Chamblee, Shigeki Maruyama, Scott McCarron, Chris Perry and Craig Barlow--are one stroke back at 136, with eight others at 137.

Tiger Woods, his streak of 63 consecutive cuts made on the line, reached 64 but not without a scuffle. Needing an even-par 142 to advance to the third round, Woods was even at the turn and one-under after 16 holes before an eagle on 17 sparked him to a 68 and left him at three under for the tournament.

Not that Woods was worried or anything.

“No, I was trying to get to four or five under, put myself back in the tournament,” he said.

Woods, with an afternoon tee time, complained of “howling” winds. But early-morning starters, including first-round co-leader Sergio Garcia, were tormented by a rainstorm that drenched the course for the first hour of play. Garcia bogeyed his first two holes en route to a one-over 72, leaving him four under for the tournament and three strokes behind the leaders.

Jimenez caught a break, teeing off shortly before noon, with the sun shining and winds not yet whipping. Jimenez eagled the first hole, a 503-yard par-five, and birdied the third, fifth and eighth holes for a 30 at the turn. On the back nine, Jimenez moved to nine under with birdies on 11 and 13 before shaky tee shots produced bogeys on 14 and 16.

“The putter is working very good today,” Jimenez said. “The back nine, the driver wasn’t so good.”

Still, a share of the halfway lead represents a great leap forward for Jimenez, winding up his fifth consecutive week on the road and starting to feel pangs of homesickness.

“I miss my kids, I miss my wife,” said Jimenez, who signed on for 15 PGA Tour events in 2001--the requisite for PGA Tour membership--after playing 11 events last year. “You have to sacrifice yourself, no?”

This is a one-year experiment for Jimenez, who lives in Malaga, Spain. He says he wanted to give the PGA Tour a try because “this is supposed to be the best place in the world to play, the best tour.” A member of the 1999 European Ryder Cup team, he plans to reevaluate at the end of the year--whether the paychecks and status earned in America are worth the time away from home.

“I love my country,” he said. “I love my family, my sons, my friends. I am 37 years old now. I don’t know, if I still have the fight inside [next year], I will come back and play here. If not, I will go home.”

Jimenez was asked how he was coping with the hotel beds and restaurant food in a land so far from home. He smiled and shrugged.

“I can eat anything, you know?” he said. “To play this game, you have to [be able to] eat anything and you have to sleep anyplace.”

And, as Love can tell him, that’s the easy part.

After that, you have to keep dragging yourself to the course and making shots and, on occasion, playing through rain and mud and cold, as Love did Friday.

“It looks like we got the worst of the weather,” said Love, who teed off at 7:45 a.m., with rain following his group through the first two holes. “I’m just happy to have survived it.”

Love remains on a February tear, sharing the halfway lead here after winning at Pebble Beach and losing in a playoff at the Buick Invitational. After two winless years on the tour, Love says he was relieved to enter the interview tent and to hear “everybody asking,’Why are you playing so good?’ instead of ‘Why aren’t you winning?’ That gives you a lot of confidence.”

Woods, still searching for his first victory of 2001, struggled with afternoon winds, basically hanging in long enough for the winds to die and leave him an opening for an eagle on No. 17.

“If you look at the luck of the draw,” Woods said, “the afternoon guys have been brutalized. Yesterday, wind howled. Today, it howled again, and that makes this golf course just that much more difficult.”

Still, despite his struggles, Woods remains within four strokes of the lead, hoping for a big round today before another round of rain is expected to hit Riviera Sunday.

“If I can get off to a good start, hopefully I can work my way back up the leader board,” Woods said. “As we all know, Sunday’s going to be a pretty difficult day. We’re all jockeying for position, so we don’t have to depend on a low round Sunday to give ourselves a chance to win.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

LEADERS

Davis Love III

68-67--135: -7

Miguel Jimenez

69-66--135: -7

Brandel Chamblee

68-68--136: -6

Shigeki Maruyama

67-69--136: -6

Scott McCarron

68-68--136: -6