SURREY, B.C. -- Who needs to make the courses longer? Just make accuracy important with tough pin placements, like players report seeing on the par-71 Northview course Thursday.
"Everywhere we go now they tend to say that they are going to make the courses longer and longer but they don't really need to make them longer. They just need to make them bouncier and make ball control a premium and the scores will never get out of control," said Peter Lonard after shooting a 66 for the second-lowest score of the day.
Even though, as Lonard said, the course played soft and therefore short, the scores didn't reflect a cakewalk.
That could have had something to do with the pins, leader David Frost said.
"This is the kind of course where you stay away from the flags. A lot of guys like to fly at the flags," Frost said after shooting 65. "This is the kind of course where you have to manage your iron shots, play away from the pins and try to give yourself a putt. I like the golf course. When I got here on Tuesday, I liked the conditions."
And then there's the greens, which are also challenging.
"I believe that because the poa annua green is a difficult grass it is tough to score on," said Shigeki Maruyama after shooting 66. "I was watching Vijay Singh in the group ahead of me and he was not making those putts either so I think it is the greens that are keeping the scores from going really low."
The lowest round recorded at the Air Canada is Scott McCarron's final-round 61 in 1999. But in the past five years, only 20 players have recorded all four rounds in the 60s.
STAYIN' ALIVE: If he can follow his 5-under 66 with another low round, Lonard will have made his 20th consecutive cut in his first season on the PGA Tour.
"My play has been pretty consistent, pretty much all year I suppose," Lonard said. "If you look at it in a broader picture, I suppose my average is good, but my best probably isn't good enough to win a tournament so far. I've definitely been improving and becoming more comfortable week in and week out."
World No. 1 Tiger Woods, who is not in the field this week, made his first 25 cuts, so Lonard still has a few to go to match that. But he has seven top-20 finishes in a row heading into the Air Canada Championship.
BOGEY TOLLES: Tommy Tolles teed off on the back nine Thursday to start his first round, and quickly racked up three birdies in a row. He went 7- under on the first eight holes with five birdies and an eagle on the par-4, 400- yard 14th hole.
The only error in Tolles' front nine, and the mistake that kept him from setting a new Tour record, was a double-bogey 6 on No. 18, his ninth. A birdie would have given him a 27, good for a tie for the best nine-hole score ever.
Tolles had a 30-37--67 to finish the day in a tie for sixth.
