SCOTTSDALE - The way he's playing, Hale Irwin expects to be a contender every week. Ed Sneed quit for eight years, resurfaced on the Senior PGA Tour in 1994, and didn't expect anything like his round Thursday.

But there they were - an odd couple atop the leader board at 7-under-par 65 after the first round of The Tradition, the first major on the senior tour.

''I think I'd have to say I surprised myself,'' said Sneed, whose hole-in-one on the 17th hole offset two bogeys in a round that also included seven birdies. ''I'm ecstatic having shot the score I did.''

Irwin, a three-time U.S. Open winner who once made 86 consecutive cuts, has been just as consistent since he turned 50 last June. He won twice in a shortened season, added another win in Sarasota, Fla., in February, and leads the senior circuit with a 69-stroke average and $338,925 in 1996 earnings.

''I thought guys would light it up, and, fortunately, I found the light switch,'' he said after a seven-birdie round.

The Jack Nicklaus-designed, 6,891-yard Cochise Course at Desert Mountain, features tight fairways among clumps of native vegetation. Many find only experience helps them to read the deceptively sloping greens, but Irwin mastered them on his first try. He said accuracy off the tee helped.

''It's a golf course,'' Irwin said. ''The only difference is that there are no trees. You've still got to put it in play.''

Jim Colbert, who nearly won the 1991 Tradition and has two other top four finishes since, shot a 66.

Raymond Floyd, the 1994 champion, was two shots off the lead, while Nicklaus, the defending champion, and Arnold Palmer shot 68s.