AUGUSTA, Ga. — Moments after following a first-round 81 with a 79, Fuzzy Zoeller wondered if his 30th Masters tournament would be his last.

“The course is too long for this old guy,” he said last Friday. “It’s no fun, and when it’s not fun, I don’t want to play.”

Zoeller won the Masters in 1979, when the course measured 7,040 yards. Augusta National now measures 7,445 yards due to changes made, mostly in 2006, that didn’t exactly cater to the champions of yesteryear.

The 72nd Masters won Sunday by Trevor Immelman capped a tournament in which the course received more praise than a year ago, when analogies to the U.S. Open were as prevalent as the azaleas. Cold and windy conditions during three of the four days a year ago compounded the challenge of navigating the length and the additional trees and rough, resulting in the fourth-highest scoring average (75.88) in history and a winner, Zach Johnson, at 1 over par.

Immelman got to 11 under after three rounds this past weekend, bogeying just two of the first 54 holes, and endured a final-round 75 to post an 8-under 280 and a three-stroke victory over Tiger Woods.

“Since they lengthened the course and put some more trees in, I think accuracy became very important,” Immelman said. “I’m thinking holes like 11 and 15 and 17 were holes you could just step up and let it loose, and now you really can’t, because those pine trees are so thick that if you hit it in there, you really have no shot.

“Those holes where you could step up and swing for the fences, you can’t do that anymore. You’ve got to be able to keep it in the fairway to be able to control it into the green.”

Sunday’s final round was accompanied by winds that reached 29 mph. It produced the worst scoring average (74.66) of the tournament, but it was nowhere close to last year’s misery.

When Woods churns out “stay patient” responses to almost every question, it’s evident the combination of swirling winds and course changes has all but eliminated aggressive play. Johnson won the tournament last year by going 11 under on the par 5s, and he didn’t go for the green in two on any of them.

“It usually doesn’t turn out too well when you get aggressive,” said 2006 U.S. Open champion Geoff Ogilvy, who was 11 over and 8 over at these last two Masters. “Aggression doesn’t usually work here. You’re not going to win the tournament powering every hole, so I guess it’s controlled aggression or aggression at the right time.

“U.S. Opens are actually a little simpler to prepare for than this because there are less dimensions to the challenge. This is kind of a different world.”

Jim Furyk, the 2003 U.S. Open champ, said the past two Masters have been anything but a “bomber’s paradise” because of the winds. Despite 8-over and 5-over finishes the past two years, he admits the gusts can be advantageous.

“I think the direction of the wind has been very important, and the westerly wind is very good for the average hitters like myself,” Furyk said. “The reason I say that is because it kind of neutralizes 13 and 15 a little bit, and it puts 7 and 17 downwind and neutralizes power.

“Everybody was puckering on 12, I can promise you that.”

Augusta National may not be as fun for players as it was a decade ago, when they gazed curiously at greens with 9-irons instead of 6-irons. But they all face the same predicaments, whether calm or chaotic.

It’s a challenge they all still love. Well, maybe everybody but Zoeller.

“It’s a lot more challenging golf course, but the thing about it is that you can still get your way around even with the wind if you miss it in the right spots,” two-time champion Phil Mickelson said. “You can get up and down and salvage par. It’s still a very fair test.”

Said 2003 champ Mike Weir: “I think these past two years have been about the weather, but I think that’s what this place has always been about. The course is very fair. If you’re on your game, you’re going to score, and if you’re off, you’re going to struggle.”

Odds and ends

After winning three Masters titles in a six-year stretch from 1997 to 2002, Woods has won one (2005) of the past six. ... When asked how he thought winning a major would change his life, Immelman said, “I have no idea. I’m sure it will be good, though.” ... One correction: Nashville’s Brandt Snedeker was trying to become the first Tennessean to win the Masters since Memphis resident Cary Middlecoff in 1955.

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