She Played Better Than She Scored

She was anxious, all right. She kept fidgeting, fussing, remarking how time was dragging. But when her longtime swing coach, Henri Reis, was...

She was anxious, all right. She kept fidgeting, fussing, remarking how time was dragging. But when her longtime swing coach, Henri Reis, was asked when he knew Annika Sorenstam would be fine Thursday in her smashing PGA debut, Reis smiled and said, ‘‘On No. 1.’’

Sorenstam was staring down the first fairway at the Colonial Golf Tournament, preparing to strike the first tee shot any woman has hit in a PGA Tour event in 58 years, and she admitted later, ‘‘My heart was beating, I felt a little sick in my stomach, my hands were a little sweaty … . ’’ Then she blasted her opening drive 243 yards straight down the middle of the fairway, eliciting an astonished roar when her shot bounced by playing partner Aaron Barber’s ball, then 10 yards past Dean Wilson’s ball, too. As Barber and Wilson walked briskly off the tee box, both were staring intently at the grass and trying very, very hard not to laugh. Neither young pro had underestimated Sorenstam to begin with, but now —after just one shot—everyone else had reason to believe in Sorenstam, too.

‘‘On the first tee I just kept telling myself, trust yourself. You can do it,’’ a beaming Sorenstam later said. ‘‘And it worked all day. … Today was more than I could ever have expected. I’m thrilled.’’

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After months of conjecture about how Sorenstam would shoulder the pressure of making history, after countless hours of vigorous debate about whether she should even be here, let alone whether she has enough game, the doubts about how the world’s best female golfer would fare against the world’s best men melted away by Sorenstam’s fourth hole, when she sank a 15-foot birdie putt and uncharacteristically celebrated with a right uppercut while the crowd roared and roared again.

‘‘Oh yes, oh yes, she’s a perfectionist,’’ nodded Pia Nilsson, Sorenstam’s former Swedish national team coach. Nilsson agreed that Sorenstam would be thinking about how she took dead-eye aim with her driver and fired breathtakingly accurate irons — she missed just one fairway and never found a bunker, never had to chip. Yet she still trails first-day leader Rory Sabbatini by seven strokes.

‘‘I want to make the cut,’’ Sorenstam said.

In golf, a distinction often is made between how well you play and how well you score. And that was the story of Sorenstam’s round Thursday.

The wonder wasn’t found in any one well-placed shot. Her achievement was how many pure shots she hit in a row. It was awe by accumulation. Many of the golfers, not just Sorenstam, said the day had the buzz and tension of a major championship. The pin placements were tight. Many of the other competitors stood on their tiptoes on the practice putting green or stopped what they were doing on the driving range when Sorenstam’s trio went by. And Sorenstam’s highly supportive gallery grew in voice and number as the day went on, too.

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‘‘I can’t even imagine what she’s got to go through just to be here,’’ said Patrick Sheehan, tied for second with a 65. He wasn’t too proud to admit, she ‘‘probably does everything, every facet of the game, probably better than I do. The only advantage I have over her is length … . She could shoot under par out here. This is a huge thing. It would be like us playing a golf course that’s over 8,000 yards.’’

Colonial’s 7,080-yard track only felt that long to Sorenstam. With a weary smile, she said, ‘‘I feel like I played 36 holes.’’ It still will take a lot for her to survive the cut. But smiling now, Sorenstam said, ‘‘I feel like I’m on my way.’’ (LA Times-Washington Post)