By LEW PRICE
Courtesy of The Press-Enterprise

It was stretched and tightened two years ago, some of its angles sharpened.

But we still haven't seen the Augusta National the powers-that-be intended.

Rain the past two years has been the defining agent at the Masters. But there is good news this week.

Augusta figures to play hard and fast, rain is not expected to be a factor before Sunday, if at all.

So this week will offer the first real look at the new Augusta, which plays 7,270 yards, or nearly 300 more than it did before 2002.

"If it gets dry and long, it's going to be one heck of a test," Tiger Woods said during the Players Championship two weeks ago.

Woods is the current owner of the track, a three-time champion and the betting favorite each of the past seven years.

But who better to assess the state of the game at Augusta than its most prolific champion, six-time winner Jack Nicklaus.

Nicklaus, while in Newport Beach to play the Toshiba Senior Classic last month, said he agrees with the ongoing transformation of the track.

"I think they did, probably, the right thing," he said. "They could have done it a little differently. It was a very wide golf course. They made it even more of a power course. It has eliminated a lot of guys. But I think they had to do something.

"But it would have given me a major advantage in my day. I might have won three or four more. It would have taken a Gary Player an extra big effort to win then."

It's that demand, Nicklaus said, that made Mike Weir's victory a year ago even more impressive.

"The U. S. Open narrows you down," he said. "It forces you to drive straight. It doesn't eliminate the average length golfer. It's about power and accuracy.

"What Weir did was phenomenal, hitting 50 percent of the greens on a course not built around his game."

And if the field catches a dry week, Nicklaus said the list of contenders will increase.

"A faster course helps the shorter hitter," he said. "He's had to learn to chip and putt and maneuver the ball around. A faster course is always more difficult to play. I loved Augusta when it got fast. "