HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. – Alex Cejka wants to stay healthy this season. Playing his best golf wouldn’t hurt, either.
Cejka, who missed more than three months last year because of neck surgery, shot his best round in nearly two years, a 7-under 64, to take a one-stroke lead at the Verizon Heritage on Thursday.
His bogey-free performance was capped by a 47-foot putt for birdie on the difficult, wind-swept 17th hole. That left Cejka with his first first-round lead since 2006, a shot ahead of two-time U.S. Open champion Lee Janzen and two in front of last year’s Masters winner, Trevor Immelman.
“Just hopefully, everything stays well and I get healthy and practice hard,” he said.
Cejka felt pain at the British Open last summer.
Over the next month, he lost most of his strength on his left side. The diagnosis was a pinched nerve that required surgery last September to fuse vertebrae in his neck.
He played sparingly until this season and his early results were not great, missing the cut three times in his first seven events.
Things perked up in March with a pair of 13th-place finishes at The Honda Classic and the Puerto Rico Open. The recovery took its biggest step yet at Harbour Town Golf Links.
He says he’s about 85 percent healthy, but was pleased to manage Harbour Town’s tiny, quick greens and narrow, tree-lined fairways.
“You’ve got to be a little bit lucky on the small greens and stuff to hit them all,” Cejka said. “But I hit good shots today.”
Cejka’s round took off on the back nine with four birdies on his last seven holes. He made a 37-footer for birdie on No. 12, then punched from under a tree to 15 feet on the 13th hole for another birdie. Another 15-foot birdie putt came on the par-5 15th before Cejka’s shot two holes later.
He was thinking lag up for a par. “Then I hit a good putt a little bit firm and just hit the hole right in the middle,” Cejka said with a smile.
Janzen, who won the U.S. Open in 1993 and 1998, posted his lowest opening round of the season. He had a chip for birdie on his final hole, the ninth, that stopped a foot short of the cup.
“It looked like it was going in the hole, but never got there,” he said.
China Open
BEIJING – Austria’s Markus Brier shot a 5-under 67 on Thursday to take a one-shot lead after the first round of the Volvo China Open.
Brier, the 2007 champion, made seven birdies against two bogeys at the par 72, 7,321-yard Beijing CBD International Golf Club, keeping him just ahead of Australian David McKenzie and Nick Dougherty of England.