Michelle Wie's golf woes sucked the rarefied air out of yesterday's Sony Open in Hawai'i first round. It was immediately replaced by 40 mph gusts.

Hawai'i's teenage terror was terrorized by wind-swept Waialae Country Club. Wie, 16, missed a day of school at Punahou School, but her golf education was dramatically enhanced. With gusts transforming a precise course into a windblown survival test, she had three double bogeys in her first eight holes and finished with a 9-over-par 79.

It was Wie's worst round in the four PGA Tour events she has played and all but ended her chances of becoming the first woman in more than 60 years to make a cut in a men's tour event. Wie, who turned pro in October, was hoping to cash her first professional paycheck here — at home for the third straight year, in the tournament sponsored by her sponsor.

Asked if she had enough fight left in her to surge into the top 70 today, Wie mustered a grin: "Definitely. I mean, you know, I feel like I can do it tomorrow because if I do the opposite of what I did today, I think I'm pretty set."

"Big Wiesy" caused a traffic jam at Waialae's H-1 exit before 8 a.m. and a leader-like, final-round following was with her from the moment she teed off at 8:40 a.m. until she dropped her 32nd putt on her final hole.

By then, Rory Sabbatini was in with the first-round lead at 5-under 65. David Toms was a shot back and Jeff Sluman and Jim Furyk, who have both won here, shared third with a group at 67.

The numbers changed little over the course of the day as persistent 20 mph winds were broken up only by bigger blasts of breeze. K.J. Choi, Charles Warren and Jeff Gove came in late to tie Toms.

Waialae played nearly two shots over par, the 71.917 scoring average being the highest since Waialae was reconfigured in 1999. The top 70 and ties today make the cut. The highest cut at Sony was 3-over 143, when Sluman won in '99 and again last year, when Vijay Singh got his first title here in his ninth try.

Singh, coming off a victory in the Mercedes Championships last week, shot 71 yesterday. That ended his streak of 10 straight rounds in the 60s at Waialae.

At the other end of the former champion spectrum, 1992 Hawaiian Open winner John Cook is tied for next-to-last with Wie. Jimmy Walker, playing on a major medical extension exemption this year after injuring his neck a year ago, shot 80 and was in last place.

It is, as pretty much every golfer would tell you, just the way the game goes.

The conditions created such havoc that when Sluman, awakened at 2 a.m. by the wind, was asked if he was "cognizant" of Wie's compelling presence, he laughed. "It is so hard out there," he said, "I'm not even cognizant of how I'm doing."

The focus required to finesse shots in and out of the wind, down Waialae's skinny fairways and across a course full of greens with very little protection from the elements was more than a full-time job yesterday. And Wie, whose school schedule prohibits her from playing much on the pro tours in general and rarely with the men, looked like she was out of her element for one of the few times in her precocious career.

"One thing that I learned," Wie said, the realization coming long after her round, "is that the guys, even if they do struggle, they always just seem to end it with a bogey or less."

Wie has yet to master that talent, at least not on this tour.

A three-putt bogey on her third hole (No. 12) snowballed into a two-putt double bogey on the following hole, when she never found the fairway. She botched an easy approach shot on the 15th into the front bunker. The awkward lie caused her to blast the ball over the green into another bunker, leading to yet another double. She air-mailed the 17th green, blasted her bunker shot far past the hole and three-putted for yet a third.

About the shortest putt she had all day came after she nearly holed a bunker shot on No. 11. That, the 17-footer she drained for her lone birdie on No. 3 — raising her hands in mock triumph — and the monstrous putt she got close at No. 2 were Wie's bright spots, she said.

The girl who missed the cut by one here as a 14-year-old was frustrated to the point of disgust at times, and in golf shock most of the day: "It was like, wow, like I can't believe I'm doing this bad. ... It was so darned hard out there with the wind and everything."

When the hundreds of fans waiting for her at the turn caught their first glimpse of her score — 7-over — on the JumboTron there was a collective gasp.

In contrast, Sabbatini, who grew up on the coast in South Africa, was at home with the wind and actually believed it helped him "settle my swing in."

"It doesn't become detrimental," Sabbatini insisted. "I think it forces you to create shots. It forces you to hit shots holding against the wind. It forces you to use a lot more imagination out on the golf course. I'm a very imaginative golfer so in some sense it helps me get prepared."

He was imaginative enough to solve Waialae's slick greens. Sabbatini needed but 27 putts. His shortest birdie putt came from 9 feet and his longest from 46.

Choi thought the wind might have been "easier to control" in the afternoon, and apparently found it that way after he bogeyed the first two holes, then felt a little luck on his third hole (446-yard par-4 12th) changed his day.

"I'm hitting 135 yards with a pitching wedge and the wind is blowing the flag," Choi recalled. "I hit the middle of the flag. So maybe if there was no flag, I go over the green. It ended up a foot (away), an easy birdie."

Particularly on an incredibly tough day.

Reach Ann Miller at amiller@honoluluadvertiser.com.