THE BEANIE, woolly hat pulled tightly over his head – not so much a fashion statement as a necessity against the cool breeze coming in off the Pacific – Alex Cejka rolled in the par putt on the 18th green yesterday to complete his round and take another step on an odyssey which is one of the more remarkable in golf.

As a nine-year-old boy, Cejka – brought by his father – swam across the river Rhine from the former communist Czechoslovakia to find a new life in Germany, where he was to be inspired by the feats of Bernhard Langer.

These days, Cejka – whose biggest win of his career came when he won the European Tour’s season-ending Volvo Masters in 1995 – is very much into the American way of life, playing full-time on the PGA Tour over here having overcome a serious neck injury which two years ago necessitated him undergoing surgery that included inserting a titanium plate and a cadaver bone to stabilise the area.

He missed three months of the 2008 season, and has only sporadically challenged in tournaments since his return, most memorably at the Players championship at Sawgrass last year.

Indeed, his season so far has been erratic, to say the least. He has made 10 of 16 cuts and has managed just one Top-10 finish, oddly enough on this very links back in February where he finished tied-10th behind Dustin Johnson in the AT and T National Pro-Am.

The return this week has been a happy one, for Cejka yesterday added a 72 to his opening 70 for a midway total of 142, level par, which puts him very much in contention heading into the weekend.

Cejka, despite his successes in Europe before making the move full-time to the States, has never been a major player.

In fact, he had missed the cut in six of his previous 12 major outings spread over a decade and a half. He is only a frequent visitor to the big shows, with a best finish of tied-third in the 2003 US PGA while his best previous appearance in the US Open came back in 1996 at Oakland Hills when he was tied-50th.

This time, he has the chance to be a contender. After firing off eight straight pars in yesterday’s second round, Cejka suffered a double bogey on the Par 4 ninth hole but responded impressively with back-to-back birdies on the 10th and 11th and dipped under par with a third birdie of his homeward run on the 15th.

Cejka became another casualty of the Par 3 17th to suffer the only bogey of his round. “Yeah, well the 17th is a tough hole when you’re standing there with 210 yards into the wind.

“I hit it a little bit short yesterday and went into the bunker. I took one club more and I hooked it, missed the green and didn’t get up and down.”

Overall, it was an impressive round from a man with little form to back him up this season but, when fit, he has proven in the past that he is strong enough mentally to get the job done.

“I didn’t really watch much of the leaderboard. You don’t need to. You are just grinding yourself and everything around par is great.”