Caddie's Role:Although most professionals are well into their '08 season, myself and my player, Retief Goosen, spent last week receiving New Year's greetings from our American colleagues as if it were early January.

The Northern Trust Open, staged at the prestigious Riviera Club near Santa Monica, California, was our season opener. Ordinarily we would have a handful of events behind us by mid-February, but this year it was to be different.

Judging by the slow introduction to our opening tournament, we were both thinking - without saying it - that a shorter break might have been better for the ball-striking and scoring in our cut-missing debut. But there was an excuse at hand.

There is the luck of the draw in most sports and nowhere more so than golf. Although having the field playing off two tees has somewhat reduced the disparity that can happen from teeing off at either end of the day, weather and, in particular, wind can split the field in two.

This is what happened at the Riviera Country Club last week. Fifteen players who teed off on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning made the cut out of 78.

The windy weather did not help the Goosen cause but was not entirely to blame for our sitting out the weekend. There were some thick cobwebs clinging to the swing and every other aspect of my man's game, and they needed dusting down on the range over the weekend.

In golf there are undoubtedly "horses for courses" and Riviera is looking like the course that isn't suited to my horse.

A couple of years ago we had the jet-lagged missed pro-am tee time which resulted in Retief being disqualified from the tournament. Judging by the quips from our colleagues and numerous spectators last week at the venue, we are not going to be allowed forget it for a long time.

There does seem to be some inconsistencies with the tour policy on these matters. The number two player in the world, and eventual winner of last week's event, was travelling by helicopter from his home near San Diego to Riviera but was unable to take off due to fog. The tour moved his pro-am tee time back to accommodate him.

There were plenty of players who were eager to tell us about this anomaly. This would seem to suggest there are always exceptions to rules, depending on who you are.

Riviera is steeped in history as one of the oldest courses on the west coast. Its most famed associated professional is Ben Hogan. In fact, Hogan had such an affinity with the course it became casually known as Hogan's Alley.

He won LA Opens in 1947 and 1948 and the US Open later the same year. The legend rated the fourth hole as the greatest par three in golf. There is a statue of Hogan on the practice putting green and a plaque on the back of the fourth inscribed with Hogan's thoughts on the hole.

We made our pro-am tee time without any complication this year and played with some locals. The course is set in what I can best describe as a canyon which stretches down from Pacific Palisades to the Pacific Ocean.

The clubhouse is set above the course, as are the very large and reinforced supported abodes which surround the club. Some of them look ready to slide down on to the course with the next heavy downpour.

As we rambled down the 12th fairway, one of our playing partners explained why there was such an unsightly and seemingly misplaced extension jutting out of an otherwise attractive house. It was the home of actor/director Mel Brooks, and he didn't like the actress neighbour who had moved in beside him. So he instantly decided to build an ugly extension to block her view of the Pacific Ocean.

We stayed in Santa Monica which is about a 15-minute drive from Riviera. Santa Monica is a stylish and elegant neighbourhood with conspicuous wealth and a starkly contrasting presence of visible poverty. With a year-round mild climate and a consenting local authority, it is home to the biggest concentration of homeless people I have ever seen in one place. You are quite likely to see a Bentley parked beside a beggar on a street bench.

Our missed cut gave us an extra couple of days to try to figure out some details on the range over the weekend. While we were doing so, we ran into a legend of women's golf, Amy Alcott. She grew up playing golf on Riviera by sneaking on through a hole in the fence. She said she was the Michelle Wie of the 1970s - apart from the fact she came on tour when she was 18 and actually won tournaments.

The New Year's pleasantries are over and we are in Tucson, Arizona, ready to start our 2008 season properly after the Riviera warm-up.