By Melanie Hauser
GolfWeb contributor

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Six hours plus to play 17 holes. A 45-minute rain delay that changed the complexion of the course. A long walk up the 18th fairway -- outside the ropes -- as night was falling. A promising front nine. Three straight bogeys on the back.

And one hole left to play -- just not for 13 more hours.

A problem? For some, perhaps. But not for David Duval.

"If you want to win this event,'' he said with that matter-of-fact tone of his, "you'd better learn to live with it."

In case you had any doubts, let Thursday's opening round serve as one more hint Duval isn't about to let anything come between him and that green jacket we expect him to win.

Thanks to the thunderstorm that wasn't supposed to happen, Duval wound up with the rawest end of the deal in the first round. The other superstars in the field played all 18 before play was suspended at 7:50 p.m. ET, including defending champ Mark O'Meara who was one group ahead in that primest-time afternoon gaggle of tee times. They sleep in Friday and prepare to play 18. Duval's alarm goes off early so he can play the 18th, then turn around a play 18 more.

Duval doesn't flinch. He doesn't whine. He takes it all in that unflappable stride of his. It's just part of life at the top. One more bump in his road. One more chance to prove -- as if he had to after four wins this year and 11victories in 34 starts -- just how good he really is.

Winning here is never easy. You know that. There's always something standing in the way -- a tee shot over Rae's Creek, a bad kick, a restless wind, a brain sprain here or there. The winner is the guy who learns to deal with it.

Take Tiger in 1997. Or Fred Couples in 1992. Or Ben Crenshaw in 1995. You think that front-nine 40 was fun for Tiger in his first Masters as a pro? Not hardly, but he survived and wound up making history. Couples survived a brain cramp of a tee shot at 12 that Velcro-ed itself to the bank. Crenshaw survived an emotional week -- and a swing that needed a last-second adjustment -- to win his second jacket.

And Duval? His biggest test just might turn out to be that ugly stretch of three straight bogeys on the back nine.

One minute the No. 1 player in the game is cruising into a share of the lead with a 33 on the front nine; the next he's struggling big time -- for the first time this year.

Call it a blip in that radar swing of his or a lousy shot. Whatever it was, it went over the 12th green and triggered one extremely uncharacteristic, one very ugly bogey-bogey-bogey run.

Duval chips onto the slippery 12th and two-putts from 10 feet. Then he pulls his drive left into the creek at 13 and, just before the siren blows to suspend play for that thunderstorm, he leaves himself a 9½-foot putt for par. When play resumes, he misses it. A few minutes later, he comes up short of the14th green with his approach and fails to get it up and down.

Duval shows little emotion behind his wrap-around shades. (AP)

Goodbye 3under, hello even par.

"Poor decision on one hole, a bad shot on another,'' he said. "And on 14, the wind kicked up.''

Another player and we wouldn't blink twice. But this is a guy who hasn't had an ugly streak like this since the PGA Championship. He's the one who shot 59 for a come-from-behind win; the one who opened the season with a big win; the one who stiffed it at the 71st hole to win the Players Championship and grab the No. 1 spot two weeks ago; the one who put an exclamation point on his ascension with a win last week in Atlanta.

Yet, more often than not, rounds here are really salvage operations. No one, save Jack Nicklaus, goes 72 holes at Augusta National without a brownout or two. Should Duval be any different?

"A round of golf doesn't stop with nine holes,'' he said. "It involves 18. You're going to run into some bad stuff and you're going to have to let the good stuff outweigh it."

Duval appeared to be doing just that when he had to walk off the course. He parred the 15th, then, after missing a birdie at 16th, he hit it to 2½ feet at the 17th and got it back to 1-under-par, two shots behind leaders Brandel Chamblee, Davis Love III and Scott McCarron.

For so many years, Duval couldn't seem to finish what he started. He'd come between himself and a title. He'd let the bad stuff outweigh the good.

Yet, in the last 20 months, he's learned from all those mistakes. He's taken a career on the brink and turned it into a career at the top. He's learned to negotiate those bumps in the road.

He's learned to live with it.

And, while, it may not seem like much right now, come Sunday afternoon, we just might look back to how he handled everything thrown at him Thursday afternoon and see that it just might be the difference between being the best player in the world and the next player to win a major.