Tiger Woods is set to make his first regular PGA Tour start in a year when he acts as playing host at the Genesis Invitational at Los Angeles’ Riviera Country Club later today, but the 15-time major champion explained that he’s constantly battling aches and pains in other parts of his body having undergone both spinal and ankle fusion surgery.
“Yeah, my ankle doesn’t hurt anymore because no bones are rubbing anymore,” he explained in his pre-tournament press conference. “But then again, it’s different. Other parts of my body have to take the brunt of it. Just like my back is fused so other of my body have taken the brunt of that. I have two different body parts that are now fused. Yeah, other parts of the body have to adapt.”
It’s been a long road to recovery for Woods, who’s played just six tournaments since the car crash that happened three years ago this week – four majors, the 2023 Genesis and the Hero World Challenge in December. But the competitive fire still burns within him and the love of the game remains.
“As far as the love, I still love competing, I love playing, I love being a part of the game of
golf,” he said. “This is the game of a lifetime and I don’t ever want to stop playing. I love being able to compete, I love being able to enjoy different conversations from across time. For instance, like today, to be able to play with two great athletes, the cross-pollination doesn’t happen with other sports. And this game, I love that and I don’t ever want to lose that.”
The various injuries have naturally lead to Woods taking a different approach to practice than he’d have taken in his prime, and the length advantage that he once enjoyed is no longer there, and he explained how he tries to get himself tournament ready these days.
“I don’t have the same speed I used to have,” he conceded. “I don’t have the ability to practice the same amount of hours, but I still do work on making sure that I can hit the ball on the middle of the face. If I can do that consistently, one of the reasons I don’t have a choice right now, my body day to day, week to week just looks kind of different. I can’t really model myself or fit any kind of model — a lot of it’s my hands and my feel. I built this golf swing the last few years, four, five years based on my hands and what that feels like. What that looks like, I don’t — sometimes it doesn’t look pretty, but I can still hit the ball flush.”
Formerly the L.A. Open, the PGA Tour event at Riviera is where a 16-year-old Woods made his first PGA Tour start, but it remains one of the few tournaments and venues that he has yet to have his name engraved on the trophy, but that’s not because the course doesn’t suit his eye. Trouble on the greens, rather, is where he lays the blame.
“I have traditionally not putted well here,” Woods said. “This is a fader’s delight, most of the holes are, for a righty, run left to right. I’ve driven it well here. There are small greens and traditionally throughout my entire career my iron game has been pretty good, but I have never really gotten hot with the putter at this course. Generally they’re bumpy poa, so it’s been a little bit tricky. For some reason it just has never compiled to a hot week.
“I had one where I had a chance against Ernie, and hit a foul ball on the last hole. Other than
that, I really haven’t had that many opportunities for some reason.”
As has been widely covered, Tiger’s split from Nike will see him compete in new apparel this week, teaming up with TaylorMade to launch ‘Sun Day Red’, but Woods dashed any hopes that the iconic ‘TW’ logo will feature at some stage in the future, saying that he doesn’t own it and doesn’t want it.
“I don’t want it back, I’ve moved on,” he shrugged. “This is a transition in my life. I’ve moved on to Sun Day Red and we’re looking forward to building a brand that elicits excitement and is transformative.”
Despite his lack of match practice, the fact that he’s giving away over 25 years to some of the players in the field, and that he hasn’t climbed onto the winners’ podium since late 2019, he remains ever the optimist.
“A nice ‘W’ would be nice, right?” he said with a grin. “I haven’t ever won this event. I played in this event since ’92 and the years I’ve played I still have never won this event. Hopefully I can figure something out and get myself in there in contention and maybe get a ‘W’ at the end of the week.”
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