Mike's Blog - RBC Canadian Open Day 2

I played a solid round of golf today at Glen Abbey, one of the better ones I've had in a while. In fact, while I'm happy with a six under score, I had a number of opportunities on the back nine to go even lower. I think I easily could have been three or four strokes better if a couple of putts had dropped.

It was easily the best round I've had with the driver in the last four or five events. I only missed one fairway, the second, so that gave me lots of confidence.

I started well, making three birdies on the first nine holes. I made a bogey on 11 after my second shot ended up in the greenside bunker, but after a par on 12, I hit a great shot into the 13th, leaving me with about five feet for eagle. That hit a mark of some sort just in front of the cup and dove right, but I tapped in for birdie. I had another great chance on 15 for birdie but just missed, lipping out on the low side.

On 16, I finally got a long one to drop. I rolled in a 25-footer for eagle and that felt great after coming so close all day. On 17 I had another great shot for birdie and lipped it out again.

Then on 18, after hitting another great drive, I had a bit of an incident. As I was getting ready to hit, the ball suddenly moved. Because it's lift, clean and place, I put the ball on the edge of an old ball mark to give me a good lie and it rolled over. I had to try and determine if I'd caused it to move or if I had grounded my club, which would have resulted in a penalty. I talked it over with officials and we weren't able to decide so we decided we'd review it on television and determine it before I signed my card. I played my shot and ended up with either a four (no penalty) or a five (with the penalty). It took a while, but on the tape, you could clearly see that I never grounded my club and that the ball moved as I was in my waggle I didn't cause it to move. So I ended up with a birdie and that was a sweet way to finish.

Today was nice in that I was able to play 18 holes without an interruption and get into a rhythm. In the first round, it was stop and start and stop and start so I never got comfortable. Today I built up some confidence and felt really good about my game. If I can get some putts to drop in the next two rounds, I should be able move up the leaderboard.

The course, however, if playing soft and that's led to a lot of low scores out there. There are lots of birdies out there so you have to keep going after it to stay in the hunt. I made up some ground today and I'll keep trying to do that . . . whenever we play again!

As always, thanks for your support.
Mike