"It was 800 miles away and six days later, but the scorching heat still blanketed the field as Roy Halladay threw his warm-up pitches in the bullpen Sunday.

Halladay's last start in Chicago was cut short after just four innings, the most reliable pitcher in baseball cut down by the searing heat and oppressive humidity.

But as each warm-up toss left Halladay's right hand Sunday, that last outing faded farther into the recesses of his memory. By the time he took the mound to face the Padres, it was all but forgotten.

"After I threw my bullpen I felt good and that wasn't a concern," Halladay said.

Less than a week after a stomach illness and heat exhaustion resulted in his shortest outing in two years, Halladay turned in vintage performance, part marathon and part sprint, in the Phillies' 5-3 win over San Diego.

Halladay studies every pitch, but he rarely keeps track of how many he's thrown. Still, when he walked off the mound after stranding two runners in scoring position in the fifth inning, he knew his pitch count was high.

The exact number was 91 -- 22 more pitches than he'd managed in that abridged outing in Chicago and far more than he'd hoped to require through five innings Sunday.

But Halladay has a knack for seeing the finish line, Manager Charlie Manuel said, even when it seems decidedly out of reach.

The Padres hadn't gone down in order in any of those first five long innings, but it took Halladay just nine pitches to retire the side in the sixth.

In the seventh inning, Halladay breezed through three San Diego batters with just eight pitches."