British Open champion Ernie Els, playing in the same group with Woods and US Amateur champion Ricky Barnes, had a bogey-free 69. Barnes had a 71.
"You guys may think it's easy because guys are shooting under par, but it's not -- trust me," Woods said. "All it takes is a couple of errant shots."
Watson didn't have many of those.
His only bogey came on his first hole, the par-4 10th, but he atoned for that with his eagle from the 12th fairway.
The real drama came on the par-3 seventh, when Watson's 40-foot birdie putt slowed as it got to the cup and hung on the lip -- then disappeared to a cheer that drowned out the commuter trains next to Olympia Fields.
"What that ball fell in, that was something special," Watson said. "It stopped short and people were groaning. I'm walking up to it and said, `That is so close, how could it not be in?' And then, hey, it went in."
On a day like this, how could it not?
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