A 38 years old with 20 years of carrier as a professional, but Kodai Ichihara was nervous wreck facing his first tournament in 8 months. He started from 10th at 8:15 am.
"I was waiting for this day to come true. I got a bit emotional since this was the first ever tournament in 8 months. I think I was really nervous today. But luckily my driving shot was saved by hitting a tree branch. I was able to hit from the fairway on to 7 meters to the pin and start off with a birdie. This great start helped me to calm down a lot."

Fujizakura CC is over 7500 yards. This aka "Monster Course" is the longest total yardage on the Tour.
"I was able to shake off my nervousness and got concentrated by the first few holes."

Last season's result was not so bad at 10T.
"I can't really say that this is my favorite course, since it is pretty difficult to conquer, by I think I like it tough. I want to be able to play well on these tough courses. I like figuring out the course strategy against these difficult courses."

As he said, his course strategy was working great and lead to 3 straight birdies from hole 15. He made the turn with 33, 4 birdies and a bogey.

He did face a tough time when the heavy rain came at 535 yards long Par 4 5th hole. He had 260 yards more to play after his tee shot, where he manages to get to the right-side roughs of the green and saved himself by holing 2.5-meter par putt. When the morning starting group all holed out, he was provisional club house leader at total 4 under par.

"It is so sad that this tournament is non-spectator event. There is complete silence even we perform well. As a Pro, we are supported huge by those cheers from the fans. But we must go on like this until COVID-19 pandemic ends. I want to figure out every possible way to entertain the fan, even at these circumstances. I was appointed to be the Fan Project Leader, who is in charge to come up with fan service materials. I am working along with Ryo Ishikawa and others to come up with something special. As for now, we are making promoting videos, but we have just started. I hope we will come up with something that fans will enjoy."