Troy Matteson, a three-time All-American at Georgia Tech, charged at the end of his rookie season on the PGA Tour to qualify for his first Masters Tournament based on his money list ranking. Matteson was a first-time PGA Tour winner in October at the Las Vegas event. The 27-year-old Alpharetta resident has agreed to share his daily thoughts with The Augusta Chronicle during his Masters debut.

Troy Matteson bounces the ball off the face of his putter on the ninth green during Tuesday's practice round. (Andrew Davis Tucker/Staff)

It was another good day for me to get some things under my belt. Just feel my way around the greens and some of the shots I have to hit. Just familiarize myself with the course.

The wind was kind of the same. The golf course was the same. Every day you can just say it's perfect. You really can't go wrong with that.

I played with Stewart (Cink) and Zach Johnson. Stewart went to Tech, and I know him. We've tried to play together a little bit since I've been out here. It's good when you've got a guy who's been out here before and played a lot of tournaments. You can play a practice round with him and learn a few things.

We discussed some shots; where you need to hit it and where you should be. And putting, the same thing. He was showing me some lines and some breaks on the greens and some shots you may not think of. It was nice.

It's strange and exciting; it's so weird to have this many people on the course for a practice round because normally our large crowds are on Saturdays and Sundays. With this event, it almost tapers off as the week goes on, because everyone wants to come out to the practice rounds and talk to the players and watch guys hit multiple shots and get a feel for what they're doing. It's really great that people support the event that much. Augusta attracts people from all over the world. This is a unique sporting event that really can't be topped.

(Monday) I skipped one onto the back left of the green on 16. (Tuesday) I hit a pretty good skip shot that actually plugged into the bank before it got up out of the water. There's a fair number of shots that are multiple-skip shots. The key is that when the ball gets closer to the other side, the last skip has to happen eight or nine feet before the edge.

Sadly enough, there was an article in Golf Digest years and years ago where Phil Mickelson told a story about skipping a ball off the water. He didn't have any other way to go. So he skipped one off the water; I think he used 3-wood. Of course, when the kids in the neighborhood read that, we went out to the nearest pond to see how high we could skip it.

Doing it at the Masters at 16, it's a totally different animal. You don't want to do something stupid. My first ball (Monday) actually missed all the water. I hit it low but over all the water. It went in the bunker. Thank God. It would've killed somebody.

I've got to go sign up for the Par-3. I was thinking maybe I'd get to play with somebody I'd know. Now that I've waited this long I'll probably get the last tee time. By the time I checked in on Monday, I was surprised at how full it was. So when I showed up, the first tee time was 3:40 p.m. Pretty late.

I don't know who'll caddie for me. I'll try to make that decision (Tuesday night).

- Chris Gay