THE SETTING was a picture postcard one. But, unlike in the practice rounds where players and caddies hauled camera phones out of the pouches of their golf bag to take snapshots for posterity, there was no posing yesterday as the marquee morning trio of Phil Mickelson, YE Yang and Pádraig Harrington – with eight majors between them – were introduced on the 10th tee to start their quests for this US Open championship.

Nope, friendly three-ball that it might have been, this was serious business.

“Happy birthday, Phil!” was a common throwaway from spectators as Mickelson, who celebrated his 40th birthday on Wednesday, made his languid walk to the tee. Dressed all in black, like the original “Black Knight” Gary Player, the US Masters champion took confident steps.

Harrington, hands tucked into his trouser pockets to offset the cool breeze coming in off the Pacific, made his farmer’s jaunt in Lefty’s shadow. Yang, it seemed, walked in both shadows.

For a time, all went swimmingly for Harrington. A birdie three from four feet on the 11th, his second, had him safely positioned on the leaderboards scattered around the course.

Unfortunately for him, it wouldn’t last, as this course, which Bob Hope once likened to “Alcatraz with grass”, proved that it might look like Paradise but that it possesses parts with wicked intent.

The hazards, they are many. Bunkers, rough . . . and, as we would discover, the Pacific Ocean itself. The 14th green has been described as resembling many things. Paul Goydos, for one, let it be known its hogback design reminded him of a 1960s Volkswagen Beetle. To get to the green, a player must first negotiate 580 yards up the hill and Harrington made hard work of each and every one of those yards. A pulled drive into rough was followed by a hybrid shot which moved no farther than 150 yards into more rough. Yet, with a double bogey or worse staring him in the face, Harrington produced a piece of magic with his 90-yard approach which finished six inches from the pin. A tap-in par, on a hole where he had never seen the fairway, confirmed Harrington’s scrambling ability.

And you’d have expected him to kick on.

It didn’t turn out that way. So often, Harrington has used a brilliant par save to kick-start a round. On this occasion, he went on a run of bogey-bogey-bogey from the 15th.

On the 16th, as he prepared to chip from the back of the green, Harrington was startled as a ball came rolling along his line. It transpired it belonged to Jon Curran, who hooked his drive off the third tee on to the 16th green.

The malaise wasn’t confined to Harrington, as Lefty too struggled. Mickelson also went on a run of bogey-bogey-bogey.

The rot started for the Masters champion on the 16th. On the 17th, he carved his tee-shot into Carmel Bay and, then, on the 18th, he cut his three-wood approach off the rocks down the left which also ricocheted into the ocean.

While Harrington again used his short game wizardry to save par, this time from the hairy grass atop a greenside bunker, pitching to eight feet and sinking the putt, he had a sinking feeling of a different type on the homeward run as he bogeyed the second and third holes after missing the fairway off the tee.

Something clicked on the way in, however, and Harrington salvaged birdies on the sixth and ninth holes to sign for a 73.

What of his playing partners? Mickelson opened with a battling 75, PGA champion Yang signed for a 73.

For Harrington, though, it was a 73 salvaged from a round that threatened to smother him. He is still much alive, still in the championship.