TIGER WOODS FELT “silly mistakes” prevented him from making a return to remember in the opening round of the Hero World Challenge.
Woods took to the first tee in the Bahamas without a competitive round to his name since August 2015, having undergone two back surgeries last year.
The 40-year-old got off to a flyer and was four under through eight, although bogeys at par-fives nine and 11 derailed a round that limped to a one-over 73 with double-bogeys at 16 and 18.
“I got off to a nice start, was four-under par there for a little bit,” Woods told the Golf Channel.
“Unfortunately I hit the ball into three bushes and had a water ball so, consequently, I let a really good round slip away at the end.
“I wouldn’t say that [I ran out of gas]. I just made some mistakes. I tried to hug that left side on nine and ended up in a bush there, made a mistake; tugged it up the left side on 11 trying to hit one really hard, made a mistake there and put it in another bush on my lay-up.
If you look at it, I made some really silly mistakes – mistakes I don’t normally make. But I hadn’t played in a while. Unfortunately I made those mistakes. I can clean that up. We’ve got three more days and hopefully by the weekend I’ll be playing a little bit better.
Woods lies 17th in an 18-man field and will partner last-placed Justin Rose on Friday after the 2016 Olympic champion carded a 74.
JB Holmes currently leads the way on eight under and Woods believes there will be plenty more low scores to come.
“We know the guys are going to go low around this place,” he said.
If you can drive the ball well here and if you’re on the longer side, this golf course you can tear apart.
“You can drive a couple of par fours, all the par fives are reachable and then you’re going to have probably four or five pitching wedges on down into the par fours. You can see somebody shooting 20-plus [under par].
“I just made a couple of mistakes out there on the par fives. I bogeyed nine and 11 – two holes I should be making birdies on. I should just tear those holes apart.”
The42 is on Instagram! Tap the button below on your phone to follow us!
” I should just tear those holes apart” – Tiger Woods, 2016
If Tiger can just relax a bit and not try so hard, he will do very well. Earlier he played superb but, by his own admission, tried too hard on one of his drives and pulled it left. Far be it from me to advise one of the best golfers who ever lived but I will anyway (my 18 gandicap allows me to do that). All he has to do is hit a straight drive down the middle, no shaping or Superman stuff, and the rest of his brilliant game will look after itself. It’s too much for him to expect that he can go back to his brilliant best form on his first outing after such a long time out of the game and three back surgeries necessitating a revised swing.
If Tiger thinks he made mistakes, he should read below….. A corrupt organization lending its boss bail money…… How many tickets will need to be sold to pay that back.
He must find a way of hitting fairways, otherwise it’s over for him.
He did. Stopped using his driver and scored a 65! He’s back!