What if you took 34 of the best golfers on the planet, put them on the edge of the earth and tried to blow their games to bits?

The golfers would overcome — not be overcome — based on what happened in the opening round of the Mercedes-Benz Championship yesterday.

Wind gusts of up to 40 mph pounded Kapalua's Plantation Course in the first round of the PGA Tour season and the 34-man field collectively shrugged. Vijay Singh and K.J. Choi, two guys who play passionately well at the Plantation, soared to the top at 4-under-par 69. They were joined by Stephen Ames, Brett Wetterich and Will MacKenzie, three guys that have four wins, a bad back, a bad shoulder and a previous life living in a van between them.

Just another round at Kapalua, where the wind was brutal — "as bad as I've seen it," said Davis Love III, who has been coming here with much success for more than 20 years. He is a shot back.

Love characterizes the Plantation as "one of the most fun courses to play with a golf cart and in shorts," but even he admitted he would not have played yesterday if he was on vacation. Then he softly spoke the praises of the Plantation.

"There is enough room to play if it blows this hard, and a lot of routes around the golf course that you can survive," he said. "If you can putt well and don't make big mistakes, you can play well."

Amazingly, many did, even with a breeze that created anywhere from a three- to five-club difference on approach shots. A dozen players broke par and the average score was 73.559 — lower than any round last year when Stuart Appleby won at 8-under and the course played nearly two shots over par.

Kane'ohe's Dean Wilson was one of only two players in the 80s, his Mercedes-Benz debut spoiled by five three-putts.

Appleby, trying to become the first to win this event four consecutive years, three-putted the last hole to shoot 73. He went out last with David Toms, who will defend his Sony Open in Hawai'i title next week at Waialae Country Club. Players went out in order of their 2006 victories, beginning with Choi, who set the course record here three years ago at 62.

"I always like to remember the 62," said Choi, who made five birdie putts within 3 feet yesterday. "However, conditions then were a bit more fair."

He finished second that year to Ernie Els, who set the tournament record by going 31-under. Choi won the last full-field event of last year for the fourth victory of his career — most by any Asian-born tour player.

Singh has won 29 times — 51 if you count victories around the world. He has done everything but win here the last three years. Singh was second in 2004, fifth the following year after going into the final day with a lead, and fell in a playoff last year. Maybe Kapalua owes him one.

"I hope so," said Singh, who has seven straight top-10 finishes here. "You don't want to feel that. Golf doesn't owe you anything. If you start feeling that way, then you've got a problem. I just feel like I've had great, great finishes over here. You can look at it that way. ... I make great starts over here for the season."

Singh hit every green but one in regulation yesterday and raved about "hitting the hell" out of his new driver, which he called "a big problem" last year when his earnings were cut in half, to $4.6 million. But the proximity of his approach shots was more than 50 feet. He needed 32 putts and parred the final four holes to lose a shot at solo first.

MacKenzie parred the final three, but an eagle on the ninth — with a 45-yard chip shot — catapulted him into foreign territory. His win at the Reno-Tahoe Open last year was his only top-10 finish. Then again, he was selling hammocks a few years ago.

MacKenzie tells tales of a living in his van for extended periods since he was in high school. The 32-year-old burned out on golf at 14 then "fell back in love with the game" in 1999 after watching Payne Stewart win the U.S. Open, and surfing in Costa Rica for three months. He is also a professional snowboarder — "I like to hit trees with my head" — and kayaks in an extreme lifestyle ideal for Kapalua's extreme conditions, apparently.

The only thing extreme about Wetterich's game yesterday was his driving. He averaged a first-round best of 281 yards and had the day's longest drive. It was 437 yards, but — and this is the extreme part — he hit it on the 428-yard 12th hole.

Not bad for a guy so worried about his sore shoulder that he admitted he hardly practiced coming into Kapalua. He birdied three of the last five holes, all from within 4 feet.

Wetterich is also a Mercedes-Benz rookie, one of 13 here. Last year he became the first tour player to go from Q-School to the Ryder Cup the following year, winning the EDS Byron Nelson and $3 million.

Ames is making his second start here and pulled into a share of the lead with birdies on three of the final five holes. He won The Players Championship and $2.4 million last year, before back problems forced him to cut his season short.

NOTES

Davis Love III called Kapalua's "extreme conditions" one of the reasons players don't come the beginning of the year. Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson declined invitations this year. "You don't put a whole lot of expectations on the way you're going to hit the ball because it's extreme conditions," Love said. "It's a hard place to practice, work on your swing. It's like going to the British Open. In all that wind, you feel like you can lose your swing and not find it."

K.J. Choi was asked, again, why there are so many successful Korean players on the LPGA tour and so few on the PGA Tour. He attributed it to the relatively easy transition from Korean tournaments to LPGA events condition-wise, and the mandatory military service for the men. "And," Choi concluded, "men also have to take care of their own family. So, receiving that (family) support on the female side, it's a bit different."

Jim Furyk is tied for seventh, two shots back after shooting 71. Furyk, who won here in 2001, has been at par or better in 24 of his last 25 rounds here. Since the tournament moved to Kapalua in 1999, Furyk — who owns a house on the course — has just two rounds over par.

Reach Ann Miller at amiller@honoluluadvertiser.com.