SANDY - With rain-softened Willow Creek Country Club there for the taking this week, and temperatures almost perfect for golf, pressure is mounting for some of the best golfers in the world to take it really deep in every round of the Utah Championship.
    In other words, this is Franklin Langham's dream tournament.
    The free-wheeling Georgian with the somber-sounding name followed Thursday's first-round-leading 63 with a 67 on Friday, and at 12-under-par 130 owns a one-shot lead at the midpoint of the tournament.
    "Instead of looking at it as nerve-wracking, I think it is kind of fun," Langham said. "I like making birdies. We play enough courses where it is a job to secure par on a hole. So when it gets like this, you gotta enjoy it."
    The only bummer for Langham, 39, is that he's played so well that he tees off in the final group today, at about 2:50 p.m. That's just an hour or so before his beloved Georgia Bulldogs take on South Carolina in college football.
    "I'll survive," he said.
    But can he hold the lead?
    The veteran who has won more than $4 million on the PGA Tour has now led seven times after the second round on the Nationwide Tour, but has gone on to win only twice - in 1993 at the Permian Basin Open in Texas and 2004 at the Rheem Classic in Arkansas.
    He led a PGA Tour event through two rounds in 2000, but finished second to Jim Furyk.
    "All in all, I'm happy to be where I am," he said. "Nobody is going to win the tournament after two rounds, but you sure can shoot yourself out of it. . . . It is going to be a shootout this weekend."
    Among the group of four golfers a shot behind Langham is 2005 champion Garrett Willis, first-round co-leader Craig Lile and two guys you've probably never heard of, Edward Loar and Richard Johnson.
    On the local side, the story of the day was Layton's Barry Schenk, who shot a 6-under 65 to make the cut at 5 under. Bountiful's Garrett Clegg (-5) and Farmington's Daniel Summerhays (-4) were the only other Utahns who made the cut, which came at -4, same as last year.
    The Finau brothers, Tony and Gipper, did not come close to making the cut, after finishing 6 over and 12 over, respectively, but there's this consolation: Gipper led the first two rounds in driving distance, averaging 360 yards, and Tony was No. 2 at 349.8 yards.
    Of course, the Salt Lake City brothers would give those unofficial titles away for a chance to be in the shoes of Schenk, Summerhays or Clegg today (although Tony Finau will play as a non-competing marker, teeing off at 10 a.m.)
    As for Langham, he said a mid-summer swing adjustment has him playing much better than he did in the spring. He's currently 57th on the Nationwide Tour money list with $80,966. The top 25 players when the season ends earn their PGA Tour cards.
    "With the greens being soft, there are going to be some low numbers, and I hope I have some of them," he said.
    Notes: Tyler Leon recorded an ace on the second hole with a 6-iron from 199 yards. It was the 12th hole-in-one in tournament history. . . . Loar shot a 29 on the front nine Thursday and a 29 on the back nine Friday. . . . St. George's Jay Don Blake missed the cut by two shots (-2) and Provo's Dan Forsman missed it by three (-1).
    Other Utahns: Kenny Ebalo (-2), Boyd Summerhays (even), Mark Owen (+2), Steve Schneiter (+3), Ryan Ellis (+2), Kury Reynolds (+8)
   
   Leaderboard
   
    Franklin Langham -12
    Edward Loar -11
    Garrett Willis -11
    Richard Johnson -11
    Craig Lile -11
    Ron Whittaker -10
    Vance Veazey -10

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