Red-Hot Stricker Heads to White House

Regardless of his performance yesterday morning, Steve Stricker had plans to celebrate at night. Arrangements were made in advance because, for this gathering, a background check was required.

Stricker was among a handful of PGA Tour golfers invited to a party at the White House for the Fourth of July and President Bush's 62nd birthday, which is tomorrow. As it turns out, an auspicious 18 holes gave Stricker reason for excitement and perhaps cause to create future party plans. He shot a 6-under-par 64 yesterday, setting him up for a weekend run at the AT&T National and providing a much-needed boost to a season with lagging success. Stricker is 5 under through two rounds at Congressional Country Club and four shots off the lead.

"I held it together," he said. "[I] got off to good start and continued all the way through 18 holes. So I can go off of this. I worked on some things on the range last night and [it] . . . held up today. So that gives me some confidence heading into the weekend."

Though Stricker has hit a rough patch recently -- he missed the cut in four of the past seven events he has entered -- he is the seventh-ranked player in the world, highest of any player in the field this week, so his surge yesterday infused the tournament with needed firepower amid Tiger Woods's absence. Stricker has had success at Congressional, finishing second in last year's AT&T National.

At the outset, Stricker seized on back-to-back birdies -- the first of which came on a holed bunker shot on the 10th hole, where he started yesterday morning -- to help kick-start a beautiful round.

"I tried to keep the momentum going and tried to stay patient and tried to get a lot of birdie opportunities, which I could," he said. "I hit a lot of greens today and gave myself a lot of looks at it."

Stricker narrowly missed a 54-foot birdie putt on No. 1 and then tapped in for par, a sequence he said "was a big turnaround." From there, he settled into an unflappable rhythm and began to make a charge.

He birdied the par-3 second hole, draining a 58-foot putt, and shrugged off a near-disaster on No. 3. His drive on the third hole came to rest at the stump of a pine tree. Stricker escaped with a bogey and then birdied three of the next five holes. None of his birdies during that stretch was longer than six feet, as his approach shots left him plenty of makeable putts.

"There's a lot of fairways, where you've got to work the ball," Stricker said. "That's the part I've been struggling with the most lately [is driving the ball]. But today I did a little bit better job with that and gave myself some looks at birdies."

After a steady performance in the morning, one that made him competitive entering the weekend, he certainly earned his night of fun at the White House. Asked about the celebration, Stricker smiled and said, "It should be a great night."