DUBLIN, Ohio — Tiger Woods got off to a slower start than he would have liked Thursday at the Memorial.
That had more do with a stopwatch than a scorecard.
Ryan Moore opened with five birdies in seven holes and never missed a fairway after the first one, posting a 7-under 65 for his best start in his 14th appearance at Muirfield Village. He was one shot ahead of Jordan Spieth, who chipped in for birdie, chipped in for par and holed a 35-foot eagle putt.
Woods made a pair of late birdies to salvage a 70 in his first round since missing the cut at the PGA Championship. He played his back nine in a foursome with Bryson DeChambeau, Justin Rose and a rules official in a cart timing them because they were so far out of position.
“We were on the clock most of the back nine,” Woods said. “That made things a little more complicated.”
Getting caught up wasn’t easy with various tee shots in water hazards, though it was obvious how far behind they were. Spieth, Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas were in the group ahead of them, and McIlroy hit his tee shot on the par-4 second into a backyard. With no official nearby, he had to walk 300 yards back to the tee to hit again. That took time. Still, walking off the fourth green, the group of Woods, DeChambeau and Rose still had not reached the third tee.
DeChambeau, who considers such variables as air density and elevation change in his pre-shot routine, went over his allotted time on No. 5 and was given a warning for a bad time. He made birdie, took double bogey from a fairway bunker on the next hole and began his title defense with a 74.
Golf still is measured by score, and Moore had the lowest on a rain-softened Muirfield Village.
He was among 22 players who broke 70, and only 44 players broke par despite the soft conditions.
■At Charleston, S.C., Japan’s Mamiko Higa shot a bogey-free 6-under 65 for the lowest round in a U.S. Women’s Open debut and took a one-shot lead over American amateur Gina Kim and Germany’s Esther Henseleit.
Kim, a sophomore on Duke’s golf team, holed out for eagle from a fairway bunker on her next-to-last hole, the eighth at the Country Club of Charleston, then had a two-putt birdie to close her round of 66.
The 25-year-old Higa tied for the third-lowest round in U.S. Women’s Open history.
Helen Alfredsson holds the record with a 63 in the opening round in 1994.
Celine Boutier of France shot 67.