Steve Stricker, Dustin Johnson conquer the elements

Friday was a day of men playing golf in winter stocking caps in Los Angeles.

“It was pretty miserable out there,” said Steve Stricker, who made it even more miserable for the other players in the Northern Trust Open, as did Dustin Johnson.

Both shot incredible scores in horrible conditions.

It started raining at the famed Riviera course about 7 a.m., or 10 minutes after the first tee time. It never stopped and neither did the players. Stricker and Johnson were the stars, with Phil Mickelson close behind. But Riviera was the winner.

Wade Stettner was the PGA weatherman on-site. He sat in a trailer alongside Hole No. 1, peering at a radar weather map on his laptop, and advised tournament director Mark Russell of when the next downpour was coming. Stettner didn’t need to advise much. They never quit.

“I’ve seen lots of tournaments stopped with this much rain,” said Stettner, who has done this for the last six years.

In 2005, when this was the Nissan Open, rain destroyed Riviera, the event was shortened to 36 holes and Adam Scott’s victory was deemed “unofficial.” This time, Riviera stood up. The water drained, the sand traps retained sand, the players played on.

In the case of Stricker, Johnson and Mickelson, they did so incredibly.

The PGA’s slogan is “These Guys Are Good.” After Friday, it should be “These Guys Are Tough.”

Stricker, the leader in the clubhouse at 10-under 132, chipped in twice for the second day in a row and almost did the impossible on No. 4, the 236-yard par three that plays directly into ocean breezes and has a bronzed plaque at the back of the green. It calls this one of the best par threes anywhere and is signed by Ben Hogan. Duffers play this one like a par five.

Stricker stroked a 21-degree hybrid 15 feet to the right of the pin that rolled toward it, circled the back of the cup and brushed the pin before stopping a foot away.

A hole in one on that hole, in Friday’s conditions, would have been legendary. Real legend was left to Johnson, whose 10 under tied Stricker when play was stopped by darkness at 5:02 p.m.

On the par-three sixth hole, famous on its own because of a sand trap in the middle of the green, Johnson squinted in the rain, gripped an eight-iron, measured the flag 152 yards away and hit a shot that landed six feet behind the pin and backed up into the hole.

He had the lead and a legend.

Then there was Mickelson, who won the last two years here. Much of the buzz about the tour currently rests on his shoulders, and so, after his opening one-over 72, he needed to go low.

He did so with a 66 that got him back in the hunt and was characteristic of how things go with Phil when he is rolling. On No. 2, he hit his drive off the press tent, and you knew it would be his day. When he starts shaping shots off park benches and over patio covers, he is unstoppable.

He took a drop on No. 2, a club length from the window where a Japanese reporter was filing to Tokyo. He bogeyed the hole but soon got on track. He finished his round with birdies on three of the his last six holes, after beating the clock magically on No. 13, the fourth hole he played after starting on No. 10.

On 13, he drove the ball just over a sand trap into deep rough. He couldn’t find it, so by PGA rules, an official put a clock on him and he had five minutes to search or go back to the tee and hit again with a penalty shot.

The frantic search was on.

Mickelson’s father came under the ropes to help. The group found four balls in the lip of the trap, none of them Mickelson’s.

At 4:58 on the official’s clock, Mickelson’s caddy, Jim “Bones” Mackay, spotted the ball above the trap in deep rough.

Saturday’s weather, according to Stettner, is supposed to bring a pause in the rain at midday, then sunshine Sunday. The way these top guys are playing, somebody might shoot 58.

bill.dwyre@latimes.com