Honolulu 13-year-old Michelle Wie buried a 20-foot birdie putt, raised her left fist and officially introduced herself as the first female junior amateur in a PGA-sanctioned event on Hillcrest Country Club's first green.

"I thought I was going to shoot 54," Wie said.

Her playing partners, Boise teaching pro Kevin Burton and Joseph Summerhays, the third of Champions Tour member Bruce Summerhays' eight children, wouldn't have put it past her at that point

"I thought look out," Summerhays recalled. "Both Kevin and I saw it going in and we're like, 'Oh my, this could start something.' "

But there would be no more birdies. No more meaningful putts would drop, replaced instead by a string of lip-outs and ultra-long lag putts that were brilliantly hit but, realistically, had no chance.

Instead of the "perfect" number in golf, Wie would open with a 7-over-par 78 on a brilliant, cloudless day that began with a few thousand people — many wearing "Go Michelle" buttons — following her and ended with a few hundred. At the turn, a huge percentage of the crowd disappeared into the school-bus shuttles that awaited.

Apparently, they had come to witness magic and all the 2003 U.S. Women's Public Links champion could give them was the best she could muster on a mediocre day. For a Punahou freshman on the largest stage in her life, she was gallant. But the gallery wanted perfection, and Wie disappointed it 20 minutes into the madness.

She is tied for 151st in a field of 155. The top 60 and ties after today's second round survive to play the weekend.

"I think I have to shoot a 64," Wie said with a shrug. "I did it when I was 10; I don't see why I can't do it now."

First she will have to find Hillcrest's fairways. She could not yesterday with her huge driver with the 7.5-degree loft, an all-but flat face that will be replaced by a more forgiving 9.5 loft this morning when she tees off at 5:50 a.m. HST. She repeatedly found herself just enough off the fairway to be in the brutal rough.

"It was tough, really tough," Wie said. "It seemed like it grew yesterday or today even. I considered it lucky to find the ball."

Despite bad angles in and brick-hard greens — "If it had not rained Tuesday night," said leader Charles Warren, who shot 65, "this course would have been out of control" — Wie had birdie opportunities.

Her thoughts of shooting 54 disappeared after her second shot on the second hole. She lost her drive to the right into the rough and under the trees. She tried to power it out and managed only to scrape it a few feet.

"I haven't done that in a long time," Wie said. "I just took it for granted the ball would go in the air. I probably tried to hit it too low and the rough was really thick."

She bogeyed the par-5 when her 15-foot putt leaned over the left edge of the hole and squirted out. Then she hacked her way down the third hole, another par-5. Wie hit a spectator with her errant drive, hooked her second shot under the pine trees, punched back to the fairway and watched her short approach shot roll all the way through the green.

Her ball stopped in the high grass behind the green. At Tuesday's practice round her coach, Gary Gilchrist, watched her lob balls from a similar lie and told her, "The key to this shot is not to have it."

But Wie had one final magic trick up her sleeve. She carved the ball softly out of the grass with her wedge and willed it into the hole, her left fist raised again when it was halfway there. Her father, BJ, yelled "Yes!" as it dropped.

Wie needed three putts on the first three holes and three more on the fourth. She lipped out on that hole and the next and did not get her first regulation par until the sixth, when she hit her 3-wood off the tee. Wie finally found a rhythm, parring the next five holes with the exception of a three-putt bogey at No. 9.

Then she bogeyed the 11th, 13th and 14th to turn her chance of making the cut into a long shot. That, of course, is what the 6-foot Wie has become famous for. With her languid, Ernie Els-esque swing, she out-drove both her playing partners on three holes yesterday.

"She's for real, no question," said Summerhays, whose college teammate was Castle High graduate Dean Wilson, the PGA Tour pro whose profile grew immensely after his gracious performance as Annika Sorenstam's playing partner at The Colonial earlier this year.

But even the artificial flower over Wie's ear seemed to droop yesterday. She hit just 10 greens in regulation and missed six birdie putts within six feet.