Nick Faldo was the inaugural winner of the Volvo Masters in 1988, but in the immortal words of Sam Goldwyn, a lot of people have passed water under the bridge since then. Still, the spirit remained willing in a sparkling second round of 68 yesterday, when there were more than a few flashes of his old form.
Indeed after almost four years without a win, Faldo's mood was a lot more buoyant than this season's six-time winner, Lee Westwood, who repaired some of the damage of Thursday's 76 with a 69. Off the course, however, Westwood was only marginally more forthcoming than after the first round, when he angrily departed without comment.
Thursday's behaviour brought a predictable mauling from the British tabloids with headings such as "Lee drops a clanger" and "Westwood gets wind up." Even the Daily Telegraph proclaimed: "Westwood in a mess after 76."
Of yesterday's performance, he said: "It was pretty much run of the mill stuff - I was just going through the motions." Then the world number five, who leads the Order of Merit by £47,000 from Darren Clarke, added: "I'm not feeling down, but I'm not playing particularly well and you get severely penalised if you don't drive well here."
After a moment's consideration about his prospects for the weekend, he said tersely: "I don't know if I can win."
Clarke clearly had his doubts, after maintaining an eight-stroke advantage over his rival. "I don't know if Lee is too far back," said the Tyroneman. "But we know he's capable of very hot scoring." Indeed he is, like a closing 64 when beating Tiger Woods in the Deutsche Bank Open last May and a 67, 65 finish to win the Bengacom Open in September.
Meanwhile, Faldo, who needs to finish runner-up here to qualify for Valderrama next week, was happy to count his blessings, which included a putting-green meeting with Clarke the previous evening. "I bent Darren's ear, asking him what he thought of my stroke," he said. "His reply was that I was picking up the putter head too much."
The upshot was Faldo holed a 50 footer on the first green for a birdie and holed two other putts of 20 feet and 25 feet during a round which contained only one, serious blunder. It came on the long 16th where he failed to get up and down from a greenside bunker.
"It's great when you can see the result of your efforts and I'm encouraged by the way I putted," said the 43-year-old, whose last top-10 finish was a share of sixth place in the European Masters in September. "I haven't had that lift over the last few weeks, which have been all uphill. Today was solid. It rekindled some of the old thoughts."
As it happened, Faldo felt that a further rekindling was appropriate, however, in that he spent quite some time on the putting green later in the day. With caddie Graham Heinrich watching patiently, the winner of six "major" titles was stroking the ball in robotic fashion, with a golf club wedged across his chest and beneath his biceps.
Faldo has encountered so many false dawns as to become extremely sceptical of the quickfix. But five birdies provided undoubted encouragement.
As for Westwood: the indications are that he will be trailing Clarke in the battle for Order of Merit honours when the pair head from here to next week's American Express Championship. And with considerably more cash at stake in the final event of the season, that is when battle with be joined in earnest.
