- The Washington Times - Thursday, July 30, 2015

GAINESVILLE, Va. — Retief Goosen and Ryo Ishikawa topped the leaderboard with an 8-under-par 63 after the first round of play on Thursday at the Quicken Loans National.

Beyond that, they don’t have much in common.

Goosen started his day on the front nine, and Ishikawa hit his first tee shot on the back nine. They live on different edges of separate continents, with the 46-year-old Goosen, from South Africa, twice as old as the 23-year-old Ishikawa, who hails from Japan.

When Goosen competed for the international team in the Presidents Cup in 2000, which was also hosted at Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, Ishakawa was 8 years old.

“I’m not thinking about age in this field,” Ishikawa said. “You can see that 50-something, 50 years old, 40 years old, every generation, the great players here [are] playing, competing [against] each other.”

Ernie Els, who withdrew from Wednesday’s pro-am competition because of a health scare, shot a 7-under-par 64 to finish the first round tied with Justin Leonard and Kevin Chappell for third. Els is no stranger to back pain, but was startled by the severity and new location of the discomfort and went straight to the hospital.

“I thought maybe it’s a kidney stone,” Els said. “I guess I’m just a wuss.”

Ishikawa shot even par through his first four holes before catching fire and recording six consecutive birdies. After two more pars, he reached 8-under with a hole-in-one on No. 4 that bounced off the fringe before rolling home.

“I hit an 8-iron, solid strike and landed like five yards, six yards past the flag,” he said. “We can see everything from the tee box to that green, so that was kind of special moment.”

It wasn’t the only hole-in-one hit Thursday. Rickie Fowler, who entered the tournament at No. 6 in the Official World Golf Rankings, started the day with a bogey but closed out his round with an ace of his own — his first in quite some time.

“Last one was my first PGA Tour start as a pro at the Frys[.com Open in 2009]. It’s been a little while,” said Fowler, who finished at 4-under par and tied for 18th after the first round. “They’re worth waiting for.”

Unlike Ishikawa’s tear through the middle holes of his round, Goosen’s birdies were spread out evenly — four on the front nine and four on the back. He said afterward that his familiarity with the course allowed him to play with a certain level of comfort.

“Some of the older guys that played some Presidents Cups here probably have a little bit of good feeling for the place,” Goosen said.

Goosen’s performance Thursday came two years after he underwent major back surgery. When his surgery was compared to the operation tournament host Tiger Woods had last year, Goosen shot back.

“Tiger’s surgery is nothing to what I’ve had,” he said. “He had microscopic surgery. I had major surgery.”

Woods started his outing struggling much like he has in recent months with a large crowd solemnly following him from hole to hole. He spent a significant amount of time digging himself out of bunkers and wound up with three bogies through his first four holes.

The 39-year-old recovered to finish the front nine at 1-over and fought his way back into the competition with four consecutive birdies to open the back nine — his longest streak under par since the Bridgestone Invitational in 2013. Woods shot even par over his last five holes to close out the day at 3-under.

“After that start, it was tough to turn it around, which I did,” said Woods, who remains tied for 27th. “I sucked it up and turned it around and posted a good number.”

Defending champion Justin Rose, meanwhile, finished at 5-under with eight birdies and three bogies and noticed a correlation between his game and his high birdie total.

“If you’re on with your iron play this week,” Rose said, “you’ll hit a lot of birdies.”

• Dan Roth can be reached at droth@washingtontimes.com.

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