KAPALUA, MAUI >> While the defending champion made a rare trip back to the 70s and Kevin Na was rarer still, Steve Stricker methodically put some distance between himself and everybody else halfway through the Hyundai Tournament of Champions.

Stricker took apart an idyllic Kapalua Plantation Course on Saturday, firing a bogey-free 10under-par 63. At 15-under 131, he is five shots ahead of Webb Simpson going into the final two rounds of the PGA Tour’s season-opening event.

The two Americans are the only golfers in a 27-man winners only field that are among the top 10 in the World Golf Ranking, with Stricker sixth and Simpson 10th.

Na is another stroke back after the first eagle-eagle finish at Kapalua led to a 64. He was 10 under on the last 10 holes, played the back nine in 29 — and still lost a shot to Stricker.

Meanwhile, first-round leader Jonathan Byrd’s Hawaii hot streak cooled during a 71 that featured 16 pars. It was his first score in the 70s here in his last six rounds and left him seven back and tied with Martin Laird.

Byrd is attempting the fourth successful defense at the TOC in the past seven years, following Stuart Appleby (2005 and ’06) and Geoff Ogilvy (2010). But a score in the 70s here, with the wind down and Kapalua at its most inviting, won’t be nearly enough.

Stricker slaughtered the place. He had eight birdies and drained a 10-foot eagle putt on the 15th. It was a shot better than his previous Plantation best, which caught Daniel Chopra on the final day in 2008.

Stricker fell in a playoff that year. He fired a 65 in last year’s third round to share the lead going into the final day but tied for fourth, his third top-10 here in five tries. There also have been six top 10s at next week’s Sony Open in Hawaii.

For all the talk about the 12 golfers who are not playing this week, Stricker, who turns 45 next month, might be the guy who has come to Hawaii most, and played some of the best golf. But, he remains winless in paradise.

That gives his five-shot cushion — equaling the largest 36-hole lead ever at Kapalua — a bit more meaning. Just don’t tell him that.

Stricker called his 63 “a special day” with lots of opportunities, little trouble and only 26 putts. But before he walked up the hill after his round, he was already strategizing for today, vowing to “keep plugging away.”

That is his golf game and he might know which buttons to push, and when, better than anyone. Stricker absolutely knows which buttons to push on the unique Plantation layout, with its vast fairways, slope, crazy breeze and stunning distractions.

“The more times you play it, the better off you are,” he says. “There’s a lot of tricky things to this golf course. There’s a lot of things that make you uncomfortable at times. You know, the wind is really blowing, the greens are really severe.

“So the more times you can play, the better off you are. I feel a little bit more comfortable here again this year.”

His 63 was the lowest second-round score in the history of the Kapalua tournament, and one shot off the course record, set by K.J. Choi in 2003 and matched by Graeme Mcdowell last year.

SIMPSON, WHOSE two wins and 12 top 10s kicked him up 198 spots in the rankings over the past year, has never played here before. But the 26-year-old is picking up where he left off in 2011’s breakout year, when he finished second on the money list ($6,683,000) and led most of the meaningful scoring statistics.

The second-youngest player in the field took the early lead Saturday with birdies on two of the first three holes. He played the next 11 in even par before birdieing three of the final four — only to find himself five back.

“He has proved himself over and over again,” Simpson said of Stricker, “especially here the last five, six years. He’s such a great player.”

In Hawaii, Stricker has been somewhere beyond, winning $2.4 million and missing only a victory. His persistence and patience at Plantation have paid off.

“I’ve just learned to play it,” Stricker says with a shrug. “You learn the lines better. The first time you come here there’s a lot of unknowns, and any time you play golf and you’re not sure of what you’re doing or what the course is giving you, it’s hard to hit a shot. So when you feel comfortable about a place, you know where to hit it, know where the correct miss is. Then it becomes a little bit easier.

“When you know where to hit it and where not to hit it, that’s, I think, the biggest key in golf.”