Johnson skates his way up Bob Hope leaderboard

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Despite a 7-under 65 Thursday, Richard S. Johnson said he wasn't really hitting it that great.

LA QUINTA, Calif. -- Richard S. Johnson has had only moderate success at the Bob Hope Classic hosted by Arnold Palmer, making the cut in three pervious starts in the event but never finishing higher than 24th.

So his performance in the first two rounds of the 50th annual Classic might come as a surprise to some people. But not Johnson.

With rounds of 63 and 65, Johnson moved to 16-under 128, remarkable scoring but still four shots back of record-setting Pat Perez though 36 holes of the PGA TOUR's only 90-hole tournament.

"The one year I finished 24th or something, I was actually fifth or something going into the last day," Johnson recalled Thursday afternoon. "So I've been up there after four rounds here before. This is what I'm pretty good at, short irons and drive it straight usually. So no, I'm not too surprised. I'm more surprised to be three behind or four."

Indeed, Johnson's 128 total through two rounds leaves him behind red-hot Pat Perez who shot rounds 61 and 63 for a tour-record 124 score through two rounds.

"It's five days, so you know that always," Johnson said. "You're going to get hot in different parts of the tournament. But Pat's a great player.

Johnson's approach to the week is to be in contention on the back nine on Sunday, a philosophy he says he's learned since winning his first TOUR event last year at the U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee. Now in his seventh year on TOUR, Johnson said he's learned from the win that he doesn't have to be perfect.

"You know that you can do it and it's not necessarily that you have to play that well," Johnson said. "But if you haven't won in a while, you kind of feel like you have to, you can't miss a shot all week."

"All that really matters now is you want to be there with nine holes to go," he added. "And then on the back nine is where most of the tournaments get decided."

Being a PGA TOUR winner and looking forward to his first trip to the Masters this year is a long way from Johnson's days of mocking golfers as he drove past a course on his way to skateboarding practice as a youth in Sweden.

"The last time I went on a skateboard was actually for "Inside the PGA TOUR" a couple of years ago at Milwaukee," Johnson said. "I can look decent. I would probably rank myself as an 8 handicapper right now as a skateboarder."

Johnson said he's sometimes amused when people talk about his competitive skateboarding days, because he's not sure he was ever that good at skateboarding.

"The media always wants to run me into like I won the world championship or something," Johnson said. "I was a decent skateboarder, I competed a little bit, but I wasn't a Swedish champion or anything."

Johnson's new don't-be-perfect approach to the game was evident Thursday in his round at the Palmer Private Course at PGA West. His 65 featured just one bogey, on the par-4 ninth hole, his final hole of the day. But the rest of the day was far from smooth.

"I wasn't really hitting it that great with my driver and still shot 7 under," Johnson said. "It felt like you kind of left a lot out there. But it's just a matter of on these courses here, if you're hot with your short irons and especially if you're playing the par 5s well. You can do really well."