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Spieth (68), who on Sunday cracked a nearly
four-year winless streak at TPC San Antonio, struggled to tame
the blustery Augusta National in the first round, but reclaimed
his nerve Friday, ending the day two back from leader Justin
Rose.
"Mine feels like steady progress," the 2015 Masters champion
told reporters.
"I wish that it felt like everything led into peaking here, but
I'm just trying to honestly have things just move 5% closer than
they did last week to structurally being where I am in the
swing, and I'm putting some very average swings on it, and I'm
putting some good ones on it still."
The 27-year-old, who drained a 30-foot putt for birdie on the
par-four 17th, shared the fourth spot on the leaderboard with
Australian Marc Leishman.
World number two Thomas (67) heads into Saturday's action three
strokes back from Rose in a six-way tie after hitting 16 greens
Friday, four more than his first-round effort produced.
A three-putt bogey on the par-four 18th was the only blemish on
his day.
"Once the greens were as firm as they were yesterday, you need
to be able to work it and have some different spins on the ball
to get it close to the holes," said Thomas, 27. "Today it was
soft enough that you could get it close and make some birdies.
It definitely helps.
"I mean, you just very rarely have a flat, level, even lie
without a crosswind out here."
The pair advanced as a number of top players, including world
number one and last year's champion Dustin Johnson, were sent
packing.
(Reporting by Andrew Both, writing by Amy Tennery; Editing by
Himani Sarkar)
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