Alarm clocks not that expensive here…

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This article was published 17/07/2010 (5762 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

AS bad days go, Minnesotan Clayton Rask had one for the memoirs on Friday.

Opening with an even-par 71 on blustery Pine Ridge on Thursday, Rask was not at the first tee for his 8:10 a.m. starting time Friday.

But since he was staying on the grounds in a motor home, a rules official was sent to bang on his door, awakening him and his caddying father.

With just a driver and a golf ball, Rask scurried to the first tee with one minute to spare on his extra five minutes of grace, though that cost him a two-shot penalty.

His father came quickly behind, but when a well-intentioned fellow caddy picked him up in a power cart and drove him down to his son on the first fairway, another two-shot penalty was in order.

After accepting an eight on the par-four first hole, and making a bogey five at the second, Rask reeled off four birdies in the next six holes, recouping all his penalty strokes.

But he could not hold it together on the back nine and wound up with a 77, missing the cut by, you guessed it, four shots.

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Winnipeg’s Adam Speirs turned a good Players Cup start into a nail-biter by struggling to a 75 on Friday, but made the cut right on the number at plus-2 144.

“Every putt is life or death for me,” Speirs said after his ordeal. “It didn’t feel comfortable at all and I’m pretty glad it’s over, to be honest.”

The only other player with local connections playing on the weekend is two-time former Manitoba Amateur champ Jordan Krantz of Vermilion Bay, Ont., who rallied with one-under 70 on Friday to finish at one-over.

“Just hit some really good iron shots today,” Krantz said as Friday’s last man out of the scoring tent. “I’m happy to be in for the weekend.”

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Local players should know Pine Ridge well enough — it’s here for them all the time.

But the Ridge’s greens are not the same during Players Cup week.

“I don’t even feel I have a huge advantage,” said rookie Tour member Tyler Mancini, who missed the cut with 75-72. Mancini is a Pine Ridge member.

“I know the golf course, where to miss, but the greens play so differently throughout the year for us members than they do for the tournament,” he said.

“They’re usually soft to hold shots, but now they’re running out four or five feet faster and they’re so firm, you have to get a yardage to the front of the green and then to the pin because you’re bouncing everything up and we’re not used to that.

“Tee to green, it’s not that difficult. But once you get on the greens, it’s work. Last year, eight-under won and the course is 6,600 yards.

“Last week, the course (in Saskatoon) is 7,200 yards and it’s 25-under to win. It just shows you how tough the greens are out here.”

The disappointed locals included Carman’s Dean North, who burned the edge with a birdie putt on the 18th Friday, a putt that would have put him in for the weekend. He shot 74-71.

Others to miss were host pro Shane Dick (76-74, and with back-to-back eagles at Nos. 12 and 13 on Friday), St. Charles’ Matt Johnston (77-74), Dauphin’s Ryan Horn (80-75), Carman’s Scott Borsa (80-76) and Niakwa amateur Scott Markham (85-80).

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Pine Ridge’s No. 9 has risen to the top of the charts, as usual, in difficulty for the Players Cup.

With only four birdies there on Friday, it has yielded just nine through two rounds and has played to an average of 3.49.

The par-3 16th is a surprising fourth-toughest on the week so far at 3.27, though that’s likely to change with an expected easy pin position today in the gully of the three-level green.

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca