Tiger Woods will play The Genesis Invitational. Woods committed to the event on Wednesday and announced his decision on social media.
The Genesis Invitational will be Woods’ first PGA TOUR start of 2024. He returned to professional golf last December at the Hero World Challenge after missing most of 2023 recovering from right ankle surgery. Woods’ last official PGA TOUR start was the 2023 Masters.
The commitment is the first step in Woods’ plan to play a consistent PGA TOUR schedule in 2024. Ahead of his return at the Hero World Challenge, Woods expressed his desire to play one tournament a month, beginning in February. Woods reaffirmed that intention after the Hero World Challenge, where he finished T18 in a 20-man field and again at the PNC Championship the following week.
“I’ll be able to walk and play,” Woods said after the final round of the PNC Championship. “We’ve been working out hard, been able to recover. We’ve been training every day, which is great. It’s been nice to knock off a lot of the rust and some of the doubt that I’ve had because quite frankly I haven’t hit a shot that counted in a long time.”
Rust will continue to be a storyline as Woods progresses through 2024. The 82-time PGA TOUR winner has played just seven official TOUR events in the previous three seasons. If he sticks to his schedule, Woods could reach seven events in 2024. That will be contingent on how his body holds up. At the PNC Championship, Woods said his surgically repaired right ankle was pain-free, but he admitted there was some aching in other areas.
The Genesis Invitational, an event hosted by Woods, marked a natural starting point for his year. Woods began his 2023 season with The Genesis Invitational and finished T45. The Riviera Country Club is a relatively flat walk and a course Woods knows well, even if it’s one of the few PGA TOUR venues he has not won.
The Genesis Invitational begins Thursday, Feb. 12.
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