Tommy Fleetwood could have been forgiven a rueful smile as he looked up at the leaderboard following a fine first-round 67 in the US PGA Championship on Thursday and saw the name Brooks Koepka above his own.
We've been here before, of course. Sixty miles east on Long Island at Shinnecock Hills, the pair fought out a classic duel for the United States Open last year, where Koepka demonstrated his cool nerve in the face of a fabulous final-round 63 from the Englishman.
This time, it was the impressive Koepka who delivered the fireworks and a wondrous course record 63 of his own. Following a similar score on his way to winning the PGA at Bellerive last year, he has now become the first man in history to shoot two 63s in the same major.
Tommy Fleetwood hit a three-under first round 67 at the US PGA Championship on Thursday
Is the old cliché that you can only lose tournaments on the first day, not win them, about to require a little revision?
Koepka is beginning to acquire something of an aura in the majors and this certainly felt like an ominous declaration of intent as he seeks to capture his fourth out of the last eight he's played.
There's no better platform to show how good you've become than playing with Tiger Woods, of course, and the defending champion didn't so much take the honours on this occasion as complete the golf equivalent of lapping his illustrious playing partner.
The margin was nine shots by the end and underlining the scale of the task in front of Tiger is the fact you have to back to Jack Fleck in the 1957 US Open to find the last time a man came from that far behind after day one to win a major.
Koepka shot seven under and could conceivably have finished with the first 61 in a Grand Slam event given that he didn't pick up strokes on either par five, while missing from 5ft for a birdie 11.
But Fleetwood's fine round was overshadowed by Brooks Koepka who finished seven under
'It was still a crazy-good day,' insisted the Floridian. 'That's the best I've felt for an awful long time with a putter in my hand.'
It was the putter that preserved his bogey-free round, when he holed from 15ft for an unlikely par at the 14th — the fifth on the card — and the putter that provoked a rare show of emotion at the 9th, as his last shot of the day fell below ground from 30ft to complete his historical
