Luke Donald shares lead with Rhys Davies, Jamie Donaldson

FROM THE AOL GOLF NEWS SERVICE
Luke Donald bounced straight back from his Wentworth wobble to claim a share of the first-round lead in the Madrid Masters today.
Five days after taking a 7 on the penultimate hole of the BMW PGA Championship and losing by one, Donald fired a seven-under-par 65 at Real Sociedad to end the day alongside Welsh pair Rhys Davies and Jamie Donaldson.
And as if to hit back as well at all the headlines last week calling him "Plod" - his brother started that - the Ryder Cup star made two superb eagles.
"I can't remember the last time I had two in a round. I don't think I've had one on the PGA Tour all year," said Donald, who almost holed his 275yd approach to the monster 653-yard ninth and then hit another rescue club 253 yards to seven feet on the 16th.
"I'm never going to overpower a course and some people think I am a short hitter, but I hit it far enough to compete. I would love to have that drive (at the 17th on Sunday) again, but I don't see the value in stewing over it.
"If I had planned a week off it might have been tougher, but you learn and you take the positives. You obviously gain confidence from being at the top of the leaderboard most of the week."
Donaldson was a team-mate of Donald when Great Britain finished second in the world amateur team championship ten years ago, but he has played 200 European Tour events since then and has yet to taste success.
Davies, on the other hand, is in his rookie season and has already won in Morocco.
On the eve of his 25th birthday the former American college player - he played with Rory McIlroy in the 2007 Walker Cup - had seven birdies like Donaldson.
It has already been a successful week for him - on Monday he took one of the 11 US Open Championship spots on offer in the 36-hole qualifier at Walton Heath.
Davies, who also qualified for the event in his amateur days, won the Trophee Hassan II with a 25 under par total and this looks like being another low-scoring tournament.
Donaldson does not even rule out the possibility of The European Tour's first-ever 59.
"If the weather stays good somebody is going to shoot something stupid - and hopefully it's me," said the 34 year old, whose round got off to an eventful start when his approach to the long tenth went into the lake, but bounced out onto the fringe of the green and led to his first birdie.
One stroke behind the three leaders are 43 year old Paul McGinley and Dutchman Maarten Lafeber, both of whom have had recent knee surgery.
The highlight of Lafeber’s round was a run of four straight birdies form the seventh, while McGinley is not yet dismissing the idea of regaining his Ryder Cup place.
The hero of Europe’s win at The Belfry in 2002 said: "I've got to do something very substantial, but I'm certainly not discounting my chances."
What pleased him most was that he kept a bogey off his card a week after having 17 birdies at Wentworth Club and yet still finishing two over par.
Donald, at 13th in the Official World Golf Rankings the highest-ranked player in the field, out-scored playing partner Sergio Garcia by seven.
Top Scots at the end of the first day were Stephen Gallacher, carrying on where he left off at Wentworth, and David Drysdale, both on three-under-69, one ahead of Marc Warren and two in front of Steven O'Hara..

FIRST ROUND SCORES
Par 72
65 Jamie Donaldson, Luke Donald, Rhys Davies
66 Maarten Lafeber (Ned), Paul McGinley
67 Francesco Molinari (Ita), Jarmo Sandelin (Swe), Phillip Price, Johan Edfors (Swe), Brett Rumford (Aus), Mark F Haastrup (Den), Niclas Fasth (Swe), Bradley Dredge
68 Alvaro Velasco (Spa), Thomas Aiken (Rsa), James Kingston (Rsa), Graeme McDowell, Peter Baker, Louis Oosthuizen (Rsa), Julien Guerrier (Fra), Eirik Tage Johansen (Nor), Richard Finch, Markus Brier (Aut), Benjamin Hebert (Fra), Gregory Havret (Fra), Ross McGowan
69 Damien McGrane, Danny Lee (Nzl), Stephen Dodd, Shane Lowry, Santiago Luna (Spa), Christian Nilsson (Swe), Shiv Kapur (Ind), Nick Dougherty, Richard McEvoy, Stuart Manley, Raphael Jacquelin (Fra), Alvaro Quiros (Spa), Daniel Vancsik (Arg), Carl Suneson (Spa), David Drysdale, Stephen Gallacher, Tano Goya (Arg), Emanuele Canonica (Ita), Lorenzo Gagli (Ita), David Drysdale.
70 Patrik Sjoland (Swe), Joost Luiten (Ned), Oliver Wilson, Simon Dyson, Jose Manuel Lara (Spa), Oliver Fisher, Pablo Larrazabal (Spa), Thongchai Jaidee (Tha), Robert Rock, Marc Warren, Oskar Henningsson (Swe), George Coetzee (Rsa), Sion E Bebb, James Morrison, James Ruth, Mark Foster
71 Chris Gane, Robert Jan Derksen (Ned), Soren Hansen (Den), Martin Kaymer (Ger), Steven O'Hara, Peter Lawrie, Jamie Elson, Marcus Fraser (Aus), Jeppe Huldahl (Den), Shiv Shankar Prasad Chowrasia (Ind), Gary Lockerbie, Gary Clark, David Dixon, Miguel Angel Jimenez (Spa), Richard Green (Aus), Fabrizio Zanotti (Par), Ignacio Garrido (Spa), Fredrik Andersson Hed (Swe)
72 Carlos Del Moral (Spa), John Parry, Sergio Garcia (Spa), Steven Jeppesen (Swe), Jorge Campillo (Spa), Rafael Echenique (Arg), Peter Hedblom (Swe), Michael Jonzon (Swe), Chapchai Nirat (Tha), Sam Little, Edoardo Molinari (Ita), David Howell, Marcel Siem (Ger), Julien Quesne (Fra), Mark Brown (Nzl), David Lynn, Rick Kulacz (Aus), Diego Suazo (Spa)
73 Gary Orr, Martin Erlandsson (Swe), Alfredo Garcia-Heredia (Spa), Pelle Edberg (Swe), Clodomiro Carranza (Arg), Kenneth Ferrie, Graeme Storm, Anthony Kang (USA), Gary Boyd, Raul Quiros (Spa), Alejandro Canizares (Spa), Wen-chong Liang (Chn), Richard Bland, Jean-Baptiste Gonnet (Fra), Peter Whiteford, Sam Hutsby, Gary Murphy, Stephan Gross junior (Ger), Paul Lawrie, Peter O'Malley (Aus)
74 Santiago Vega de seoane (Spa), Henrik Nystrom (Swe), Richie Ramsay, Andrew Coltart, Scott Drummond, Robert Coles, Alvaro Salto (Spa), Scott Hend (Aus), Marco Ruiz (Par), Phillip Archer, Alastair Forsyth, Rafael Cabrera Bello (Spa)
75 Steve Webster, Carlos Balmaseda (Spa), Ricardo Gonzalez (Arg), Felipe Aguilar (Chi), Gabriel Canizares (Spa), Pedro Linhart (Spa), Andrew Marshall, Pedro Oriol (Spa), Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano (Spa), Barry Lane
76 Fredrik Ohlsson (Swe), Andrew McArthur, Ariel Canete (Arg), Paul Broadhurst
77 Neil Cheetham, Scott Strange (Aus), Simon Thornton
79 Jean-Francois Lucquin (Fra), Javier Colomo (Spa), Carlos Rodiles (Spa), Jorge Simon (Spa)
80 Michael Campbell (Nzl), Jyoti Randhawa (Ind)
81 Mikael Lundberg (Swe)
RTD: Jose-Filipe Lima (Por)
WD: Andrew Tampion (Aus) 83
DQ: Hennie Otto (Rsa) 78