Dave McNabb scorches Huntingdon Valley with a 66 to take Philadelphia Open lead

Owning the first tee time of the day Wednesday off hole No. 1, Dave McNabb beat the traffic, beat the heat and beat 116 other players – for the first round, anyway – at the 115th Philadelphia Open.

McNabb, the head professional at Applebrook Golf Club in Malvern, took advantage of his 7 a.m. start and fired a 4-under-par 66 over the demanding 6,786-yard Huntingdon Valley Country Club layout for a one-stroke lead over Pine Valley’s Jeff Osberg, the runner-up in last month’s Philadelphia Amateur.

It was an ideal day for the 53-year-old McNabb, leaving his Newark, Del., home early enough not to get caught up in the morning rush hour and completing his round before the searing heat made the course’s firm greens that much more difficult.

“I think it’s certainly helpful,” McNabb said of the early start. “I don’t mind playing in the heat so much, but if you get on this golf course and if it dries out or the wind picks up, it can really wreak havoc with you. You can hit good shots and end up in some pretty bad spots, so it’s certainly helpful to get out and beat the heat and get some nice conditions first thing in the morning.”

Conditions for scoring were difficult. McNabb and Osberg were the only players to break par and four players – George Forster of Radnor Valley, Zac Oakley of Bidermann and amateurs Lukas Clark of Jericho National and John Brennan of Philadelphia Cricket – matched it.

The field began at 131 players but was reduced to 117 with withdrawals before and during the event. A total of 66 players will compete in Thursday’s second and final round after the cut figure was set at 6-over 76.

McNabb, who won senior player of the year honors last year in the Philadelphia Section PGA, birdied six holes on the front nine, with his longest birdie putt coming from 20 feet at the eighth hole. His only major stumble of the round was a double bogey at the par-3 13th, where he splashed his tee ball in the pond guarding the front of the green.

“The golf course is fantastic,” he said. “It’s firm and fast. I love how this place plays when it’s like that. It’s such a demanding test from tee to green – off the tee, on the green, you’ve just got to pay attention for 18 holes.”

Osberg, 35, who teed off after McNabb had finished, took advantage of his local knowledge at Huntingdon Valley, where he was a member for six years. After opening with nine pars, he carded birdies at the 10th, 12th, 15th and 16th holes.

“I think just being comfortable off the tee, knowing kind of what I want to do on every hole, not really having to second-guess my approach to each hole, obviously is a comfortable feeling,” he said. “It’s nice to be able to do that.”

Osberg has had a pair of near-misses thus far in 2019 Golf Association of Philadelphia majors. He led with nine holes to play in the Middle-Amateur before putting struggles dropped him to a tie for ninth, and he reached the final of the Philadelphia Amateur.

“I thought I was playing extremely well and carried that over to today,” he said. “So I’m really not going to think about too much [Thursday], just keep playing the same game I’m playing, hopefully drop some putts and see if it’s good enough at the end.”