The United States made a clean sweep of the five foursomes matches on the opening day the Presidents Cup match against the International team in Gainsville, Florida yesterday.
The only prior clean sweep in the history of the event came on the opening day here in 1994 when the Americans raced to a 50 win in the fourballs on the way to a 20-12 overall triumph.
"We obviously didn't get off to the start we wanted, but we can get it all back tomorrow," Ernie Els said.
Tiger Woods and Notah Begay squandered a three hole lead with eight to play, falling all square after 13 holes. But they birdied the par-four 14th to put the US 1-up and sank a five-foot par-saving putt on the par-three 16th to keep the lead.
"We let three holes slip away," Woods said. "I just felt like it was one of those putts where I see the line, stroke it and it goes in."
Singh missed an eight-foot birdie on 17 that would have squared the match. Woods blasted a tee shot on the 18th and Begay put his friend eight feet from the pin, setting up a pair of pars to seal a US victory.
Phil Mickelson and Tom Lehman won seven of the first eight holes for a six-up lead on the way to defeating Australians Greg Norman and Steve Elkington 5 and 4.
