In the best American tradition, everybody has to have an angle. So it is that the MCI Classic, starting this morning at the Harbour Town Links on Hilton Head Island, also carries the local appendage of The Heritage of Golf. And after the green jackets of Augusta National, officials here are in red.
But the twain are meeting this week, through the presence of newly-crowned US Masters champion Mark O'Meara, who is seeking an extremely rare double. Since the tournament took its present slot in the fixture list in 1983, Bernhard Langer, in 1985, is the only Augusta winner to have gone on to capture this title.
Now, O'Meara becomes the eighth such challenger. And despite the late withdrawal of David Duval, joint runner-up in the Masters last Sunday, he faces a formidable field which includes defending champion Nick Price, along with 14 of the top-20 players on the current US money list.
There are also 14 current Ryder Cup players in the field, including Ireland's Darren Clarke, who was tied eighth on his Masters debut. A measure of the 29-yearold's progress is that he has moved up to 31st in the world rankings, only a place behind no less a figure than Nick Faldo, another challenger this week.
Through his performance last Sunday, Clarke outstripped Ronan Rafferty's 14th place finish at Augusta in 1990. Now he is looking to pass another Rafferty target of having attained the highest position (18th) by an Irishman in the world rankings. "I believe Augusta could be the turning point in my career," he said.
After intensive work for the last two weeks, he took something of a break yesterday in that he didn't play a practice round. But he still spent time with his wedges and putter around the practice, and promised, with a broad grin, to do Gary Player's bidding and lose some weight.
Faldo, whose US Tour breakthrough came by beating Tom Kite for this title in 1984, is challenging once more, having missed his second successive cut at Augusta last weekend. "I need a serious injection of confidence," he said yesterday. "I've been working very hard and it's about time I was rewarded."
Price experienced the same fate last Friday, but wasn't sorry to leave Augusta National for the 150-mile journey down here to the Atlantic coast of South Carolina.
"By the time I had driven down Magnolia Lane, I had forgotten about it," he said.
Remarkably for a player who set the course record with a third round 63 in 1986, he went on: "Quite frankly, I'm not pleased with what they do in Augusta. I'm glad there are 51 other weeks in the year. You can hit good golf shots there and still make double-bogeys. The place frustrates the hell out of me.
"It's a relief to come from there and play a course like Harbour Town that's less tricky. This is more pure. You get rewarded here for hitting good iron shots."
O'Meara arrived on the practice ground on Tuesday to applause from spectators and from his peers. And there was a similar response when he stepped onto every tee during nine holes of practice. If that sort of thing happened in the recent past, he would have known instinctively that his friend, Tiger Woods, was close by.
All sorts of items were proffered for his autograph - hats, hole flags, golf balls, napkins from the Heritage Grill, a woman's back and even a five-dollar bill. Nobody was refused. "He's one of the nicest guys out here," said his caddie Jerry Higgenbotham.
"This is going to be a very popular win on tour, because Mark is so well liked. It's going to open a lot of doors for him because he's now the man. But winning the Masters won't change him. It will just make him happier."
Despite its name, Harbour Town is not a links but a typically American-style parkland course which happens to be by the sea. It is characterised by narrow fairways between trees, small greens, liberal use of sand and water and a memorable finishing hole.
That is the 473-yard 18th where sea breezes are invariably a feature. From the back tee, competitors have to avoid a long stretch of marshland to the left, before hitting a mid-iron second shot to a green dominated by the famous lighthouse in the background. By any standards, it is a stunning, finishing hole.
Price carded rounds of 65 69 69 and 66 to take top prize of $270,000 in last year's tournament with a 15-under-par aggregate of 269. The fund has since been increased to $1.9 million for a first prize of $342,000. Clarke goes into action at 8.09 a.m. with Americans David Edwards and Frank Linkliter.
