Playing the kind of golf you'd expect from a man who's just had life give him a big wink, Jeff Woodland shot a five-under-par, no-bogey, 67 to open the Ben Hogan Utah Classic Friday at Riverside Country Club.
When today's second round begins, the line forms behind him. When you're rolling you're rolling. It looks like he may not boomerang back to Australia after all.Woodland, or "Woody" as he's called by his mates, is from Queensland, Australia. He's 35 years old and he started playing golf more than 20 years ago. He turned professional in his homeland in 1978, the same time as Greg Norman and slightly ahead of other Aussie golfers you've heard of and from such as Wayne Grady and Ian Baker-Finch. Woodland was best man at Baker-Finch's wedding and Baker-Finch was best man at Woodland's wedding, which took place a little over three years ago.
That point in time is significant in that Woodland confesses that it wasn't until after he met and married Rita, his wife, that he started to get more serious about golf and, in turn, began to pursue a lifestyle more conducive to a day job.
"I used to like a party and a cold beer," he says. "I guess I was a bit like Ray Floyd in his early days."
He was successful enough in Australia - where his credits included a fifth place finish in the Australian Open and a third place finish in the Australian Masters - but settling down made him expand his sights to the horizon where Norman and Baker-Finch and Grady had gone before him: To the U.S. PGA Tour.
At the end of the 1990 season Woodland flew to America and enrolled in the PGA qualifying school, where he hoped to secure his Tour playing card. He missed by one shot.
There was a consolation prize, however. Coming that close qualified Woodland for the Ben Hogan Tour, the PGA's new development tour that had made its debut in 1990. If he could finish among the Hogan Tour's top five money winners during the 1991 season he could make it to the PGA Tour that way.
Woodland decided to have a go . . . and finished seventh.
Undaunted, he and Rita - and by now a baby boy named Troy - bought a house in Florida and decided to give the Hogan Tour another try during the 1992 season.
Woodland continued to be one of the best players on the Hogan Tour, winning the Wichita Classic in early August. But by the end of August he was 11th on the money list, still six places from the big-time Tour.
Which is when the Golf gods cut him a break.
For some reason - and it probably had a lot to do with the announcement that the Nike Company would replace the Ben Hogan Company next season as the official sponsor of the new and improved secondary tour - the PGA decided three weeks ago that instead of the top five Hogan money winners moving on to the 1993 PGA Tour, that number would be doubled to include the top 10.
In the two Hogan events preceding this week's Utah Classic, Woodland has shot over par in just one round, and that was by one stroke. Every day is a g'day. He finished 12th in Washington at the Tri-Cities Open and seventh in Idaho at the Boise Open. That was enough to advance him into 10th place on the money list as the Tour moved onto the Riverside Country Club course in Provo.
Friday's opening round at Riverside further enhanced his standing. If he can hold his position through the weekend and claim the $25,000 first prize, he's a shoo-in for a different Tour next season. If he doesn't win, but finishes near the top, he'll still be in terrific shape with just three Hogan events - all in California - left on the 1992 calendar.
"I'm basically trying to concentrate on each shot rather than concentrate on the excitement of all this," says Woodland. "I'm trying to control my game since I can't control anyone else's. I'm really a pretty laid back sort of a guy. I'm not real jumpy. What will be will be. After 12 years of professional golf I've learned that."
"I'm absolutely thrilled to pieces that they gave us the extra spots," he says. "That inspired me to knuckle down."
By January he could be teeing it up with Baker-Finch and Norman and Grady as yet another Aussie sensation on the American PGA circuit. "Of that group, I'm the slow starter," says Woodland. But he seems to be catching up.