What became abundantly clear on the first day of the 2008 Masters is that the Augusta National is a tough as it has ever been.

Conditions were perfect with a negligible breeze and relatively soft receptive greens, yet no one could better a four-under-par 68.

The average score was 74.18, so a fraction higher than two over par. This compares with 76.195 in 2007 when conditions were considerably tougher.

The 17th played the toughest hole in relation to par. There were only three birdies compared with 37 bogeys or worse.

Players were most likely to pick up shots at the 13th, which, ironically, was one of the two holes bogeyed by Tiger Woods. There were 39 birdies and one eagle on the 510-yard par-five.

Ian Poulter suffered a scare after his hole-in-one at the 16th. The Englishman thought he had lost the ball that had provided him with “the greatest adrenaline rush of my life.”

Poulter revealed: “I asked my caddie at the back of 18, ‘Where did you put that ball?’ He said, ‘It’s the one in your hand’.”

This set the alarm bells ringing because Poulter knew he had changed balls after the 17th where he had dropped a shot. He always changes balls after a bogey.

“He dived back into his pocket and got it,” Poulter said with a smile. His ace was the 11th hole in one at the 16th in the tournament’s history.

As this Diary revealed earlier in the week, Gary Player, who is playing his 51st Masters, has no plans to give up competing here. Player remains as fit as a fiddle having followed a simple eating regime throughout his life.

“To me the poisons of the world are the bacons, the ice cream, the white bread, dairy products,” he reasons. “I try to stay away from that. Fat makes you fat.”

Fuzzy Zoeller has a slightly different outlook on life and doesn’t anticipate matching Player’s Augusta longevity. “Hell, I had a hard enough time getting through the day,” he said.

“For God’s sake, are you kidding? Arnold Palmer asked me this morning ‘What the hell are you doing playing?’ I said that’s a good point.”

The 56-year-old, who was champion on his debut in 1979, opened up with a nine-over-par 81.

Boo Weekley continues to entertain in his daily column in the Augusta Chronicle. The plain speaking 34-year-old has an interesting take on Amen Corner, the picturesque stretch of holes from the 11th though to the 13th.

“What’s Amen Corner?” he muses. “Why is that a corner? It should be 12, 13 and 14 shouldn’t it?” Well, he has a point, given that there is an abrupt change of direction from the 13th green to the 14th tee, but I don’t anticipate a rewriting of history.

And no great surprise in Weekley's post-round eating habits. “I’m a meat-and-tater man. I ain’t much on them vegetables,” says the man for whom there is no greater pleasure than shootin' or hookin' and then cookin' dinner.