Matthieu Pavon and Victor Pérez in contention at the US Open, Frédéric Lacroix in trouble

It was long believed that Matthieu Pavon, the French number 1, would be among the lucky few to beat the Oakmont monster. At the end of his first nine holes—he started his day on the 10th—he was even at the top of the leaderboard, at -3, one shot behind American leader JJ Spaun. On the 18th, he even had a great opportunity to join him, but his birdie putt grazed the hole.

But golf is long, very long indeed. You have to be patient, and the good feelings can quickly disappear. This is what happened to the Bordeaux player who, as he has often done since the start of the season, encountered putting problems. Yet, it was his best ally a few months ago, the one that allowed him to win and climb very high in the world gold medal hierarchy.

This is no longer the case, he twice conceded 3 putts on the return. It's infuriating, and it somewhat spoils the overall impression and the scorecard that could have been so beautiful. But Matthieu Pavon is not a guy who sees his sport in black. At the end of his long day - his round lasted more than 5 hours and 30 minutes with quite a bit of traffic - he preferred to keep the positive, to emphasize what he did well, on his long game, his irons, his approaches and strategy.

"What's difficult is combining the difficulty of the course with the game, which is very slow. (...) You end up exhausted."

"I played pretty well, unfortunately the course is difficult..." he commented. "I like this kind of atmosphere, once again a bogey costs less than in tournaments that are won at -20! Today, we take the bogey a little more lightly. I made two 3-putts and I missed some small putts, it's a bit of a shame. But I'm here, I'm not too far behind, it would have been nice to finish under par. What's difficult is to combine the difficulty of the course with the game which is very slow, it's slow, we mark time, we don't move forward. We wait a lot. And then when you get to the green, it's not won yet. We finish exhausted, but I still have some battery for tomorrow (Friday). » He even had a bit left over, since at the end of his first round, he went to work on his putting to try to heal it. To find at least a bandage for this weekend.

Victor Pérez also fought hard. For his sixth US Open—where he never managed to make the cut—he had his best start yet, which was encouraging for the second day and confirmed all the progress noted in recent weeks, something his coach Pete Cohen confirmed on Tuesday when asked about his pupil's level of play. Very patient, he also had a fair amount of luck, with two free drops on the impressive par 3 8th hole . "I'm pretty happy, even though it was a tough day with quite a few players struggling. I'm happy with everything, I was patient with two birdies, I'm happy with my driving, once again, I was patient, I accepted bogeys on the 7th and 15th."

For his part, Frédéric Lacroix had never played a Major before qualifying for this US Open and, for his first time, he had a rather difficult day on the Oakmont course . The Parisian can console himself by looking at the leaderboard. He will see that other players, much more experienced than him, also struggled. He returned a card of 76 (+ 6) with six bogeys including a terrible sequence between the 14th and the 16th. After a complicated start (+ 2 after 2 holes), he tightened up his game, chained the pars but this demanding course is exhausting. Jérôme Theunis, his coach, followed him and assures that his pupil played well, that he did not lack much to return a better card.

At the end of his first round, exhausted and eager to debrief with his team, Frédéric Lacroix agreed to share his impressions of a day like no other, a day he won't forget. " It's tough, every little missed shot will be penalized, and that'll be the case for the rest of the week. But it's still not bad, there were quite a few good things, unfortunately some small mistakes. Well, I didn't make a double-bogey, that's already not bad, it's a small victory. It's never over. You never know about the cut..."

"On the course, I felt good, I thought I was going to be more tense on the 1st tee, " he said. "I hope to hit one or two more fairways, have a little more success putting... Once again, it was tough, I'm going to concentrate, I'm going to do the work. There you go, I hit a lot of good shots, after hitting a good shot in the rough, it's useless. I have to look at the strategy a little to see if there are things to change, be more defensive on some shots, more aggressive on others. It's not a big deal, I could have brought back a +3." This Friday, he will play at 6:45 a.m. local time (12:45 p.m. French time).