COURSE BECOMES CURSE.

Byline: Dave Shelburne Daily News Staff Writer

Almost all of them went into this one blind - qualifying school graduates, Nike Tour alums and early week qualifiers the same as the veterans and greybeards of the PGA Tour.

And their caddies.

Few of the 78 remaining players in this week's Nissan Open had ever seen, let alone played, Valencia Country Club before the Santa Clarita Valley course was selected as a one-year-only substitute host for Riviera Country Club.

Their unfamiliarity, as much as the weather - first torrential rain, then cold, gusting winds - has given Valencia such an advantage that the 4-over-par cut total was the highest on tour this year and just 29 players are under par entering today's final round.

Billy Mayfair says the situation has leveled the playing field more for this tournament than most.

``The biggest thing is that everyone is equal now,'' he said, ``from the tour school guys to the guys that have been out here a long time.''

All are equal, it seems, in the chance to find trouble.

Mayfair has enjoyed a good week, averaging more than six birdies a round. But he's also been stung by 11 bogeys - five Friday, when wind-dried greens and difficult pin placements undid a lot of the learning the pros and their caddies had been been working on since Monday's rain.

``The best thing is just playing the practice rounds and every day just trying to learn more and more about the golf course,'' Mayfair said Saturday. ``Today was hard because we'd played it in such high winds every day, even in the practice rounds, and all of a sudden the winds stop. Now, the golf course sets up completely different.''

Mayfair said the caddies, who usually can offer their pros so much help, are in the same boat.

``We're both learning together, absolutely,'' he said. ``We're all learning together this week.''

Duffy Waldorf, a 12-year tour veteran, is an exception. He's an area resident and honorary member at Valencia and plays there when his tour schedule permits. But Waldorf said he has never seen the kind of frightening pin placement the pros have seen this week on Valencia's large and undulating greens.

``The pins are never tucked like this out here,'' he said. ``They want us to finish.''

Waldorf wasn't the only player to notice the difficulty of Valencia's quickening greens.

``There are some pretty scary pins out there,'' Tiger Woods said. ``You don't get the ball in the right area and you're going to have some tough putts.''

Learning the right spots has been an ongoing process during a week of almost daily weather changes - from rain to wind and cold to warm and hardly any wind Friday.

Valencia head pro Rick Smith said about 10 caddies came out last week to scout out the layout. But for most of this week's 144 bag-toters as well as their employers, its been a case of on-the-job training.

``The tough thing is you don't know where to miss it,'' said Eric Meller, who caddies for Andrew Magee.

``You do what you can. We try to visualize, but until you're out in every situation you can't memorize the golf course.''

Mother Nature didn't help much.

``I tried to come out Monday, but the rain messed that up,'' Meller said. ``The thing you want to do most out here is to start to learn the greens. Of course, you've got to take the ridges a lot more - the greens are much more undulating.''

Shawn Segars, caddie to Gary Cheesman, said tour pros are so skilled they don't need a lot of help.

``A good practice round helps,'' Segars said. ``We look at the course, look at the layout, the distances over the bunker, what the wind does - things like that.

``It's not hard to see where the danger is.''

Segars said most of the time, the caddie's main job is to keep his golfer positive.

``These guys know their shots,'' he said. ``It doesn't take time for them to get used to (the course). My job is to motivate them - keep them up.''

``It's a little bit of an adjustment, but it's a plus for the younger guys.'' said former club pro Bob Friend, who earned his tour exemption this year with a 63 in the final round of qualifying school.

Two-time tour winner Ted Shulz took the pragmatic viewpoint: ``You play when you can and learn as much as you can.''

What's Shulz learned this week at Valencia?

``I need a better golf swing.''

-- Staff Writer Lee Barnathan contributed to this story.

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PHOTO The unfamiliar, weather-battered Valencia course has been a mystery to pros like Billy Mayfair, right, and caddy Montana Thompson.

Tina Gerson/Daily News