Online exclusive: Euan McLean's Masters Blog

Apr 13 2008 by Euan McLean

HE'S barely been heard of outside his home town of Nashville.

It's his first US Masters as a professional and his lofty position second top of a major leaderboard would induce a nosebleed in most golfers of his limited experience.

Yet when the wind howls into Augusta National today there will be no one who knows more about handling Augusta in every condition than 27-year-old Brandt Snedeker.

Today's final round beside leader Trevor Immelman in the final group will be approaching his 50th trip around the National this year alone. I say approaching because he's starting to lose count himself by now.

Makes you sick, doesn't it? Most of us mere mortals would consider ourselves forever blessed just to grace Augusta's hallowed manicured fairways just once in a lifetime.

And at this point I can't resist dropping in that I am one of the lucky few to see my name chosen from the lottery for media covering the event to play the course the morning after. Apologies if you've heard that before, which would probably make you one of the thousands of strangers I stopped in the street throughout 2006 to bore them with tales of the day I shot 94. On the front nine!

Anyway, Snedeker has exploited to the full his rare privilege of having unlimited access to the course for the year leading up to his Masters appearance to play it more than most of the club's members.

And fair play to him for it because it suggests that he has the same unbridled enthusiasm for the game as when he was a wide-eyed kid watching the Masters on telly and dreaming that maybe one day...

His thrill rides round every nook and cranny of this special place have taken admirable effort too, driving five hours there and back from Tennessee, usually for 36 holes each time time.

He admits himself to tearing the backside out of the courtesy of the world's most private club - "I wanted to keep playing as often as I could in case they decided one day to take it away" - but now it seems his, ahem, thorough preparations could pay off big time today.

If it does he'll be the first player to win on his professional Masters debut since the man who'll come hunting for him this afternoon, one Tiger Eldrick Woods.

If he doesn't? Well, he's bound to earn a huge jump in the world rankings that might earn him another 50 freebies next year on the course most golfers would sell their granny to play just once.