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By Stewart Moore
PGA TOUR Staff

NORTON, Mass. -- Camilo Villegas carded a first-round 63 in the Deutsche Bank Championship on Friday and takes a two-shot lead heading into Saturday's second round. This ties the lowest opening round in tournament history (63, Justin Rose, 2003) and is also a career-low round for Villegas in his PGA TOUR career.

Camilo Villegas' playoff hopes are on an upward trajectory after his excellent opening round. (Jim Rogash/WireImage)

INSIDE THE NUMBERS

VILLEGAS' BEST 2007 FINISHES

Event Result AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am T11 Honda Classic P2 Verizon Heritage T29 AT&T Classic T3 U.S. Open T26 U.S. Bank Championship T28 Canadian Open T10 PGA Championship T23 The Barclays T21

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• This marks the first time in Villegas' career that he has been a leader or co-leader through 18 holes of a PGA TOUR event.

• Villegas is riding a streak of consistency with top-25 finishes in his last three PGA TOUR events (tie for 10th, Canadian Open; tie for 23rd, PGA Championship; tie for 21st, The Barclays).

• At day's end, Steve Stricker (67, tied for ninth) was the only player currently in the top-10 on the FedExCup points list who found himself in the top-10 on the leaderboard. Stricker has now recorded seven of his past eight rounds in the 60s on the PGA TOUR.

• Mike Weir's first-round 65 marks only the second time in 2007 that the Presidents Cup International Team member has opened a PGA TOUR event with a round in the 60s (The Barclays: 69-73-72-67--281).

• Weir, currently 88th on the FedExCup points list, needs to finish fifth or better in order to advance to next week's BMW Championship. Weir's last top-five finish on the PGA TOUR came at the 2006 AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am (tie for third).

• There have only been seven 18-hole leaders on the 2007 PGA TOUR who went on to win the tournament that week. Tiger Woods (2006) is the only first-round leader in Deutsche Bank Championship history to win the event that year.

• Ryan Moore, currently 52nd on the FedExCup points list, is coming off of two missed cuts in a row at the PGA Championship and The Barclays. When Moore missed back-to-back cuts earlier this year at the Nissan Open and the Honda Classic, he followed it up with a tie for eighth at the PODS Championship the next week -- one of two top-10 finishes this year.

• After not missing a cut in the 2007 season, Vijay Singh is coming off of missed cuts at his last two events and is in jeopardy of missing a third in a row after a first-round 74. Singh has never missed three straight cuts in his PGA TOUR career.

• Players ranked 1-40 on the inaugural FedExCup points list at the start of the week have already guaranteed their spot in next week's BMW Championship. Players from 41 to 64 at the start of the week are considered "probable" to make it to Chicago.

• Steve Elkington used 20 putts (two shy of the all-time PGA TOUR record of 18, shared by six players) on his way to a first-round 66.

• Villegas was one of nine players to record zero bogeys on Friday. Other players with bogey-free rounds: Heath Slocum, Craig Kanada, Matt Kuchar, Kevin Sutherland, Jim Furyk, Zach Johnson, Jeff Maggert, and Will MacKenzie.

• The par-4 fifth played as the most difficult hole on Friday with a scoring average of 4.287. In all, the course played to a stroke average of 70.625

• K.J. Choi withdrew after the completion of the first round with back pain. Fred Funk withdrew after the first round.