AUGUSTA, Georgia — Tiger Woods has not played in a competitive golf tournament for 17 months. He has what he said Tuesday “hardware” in his right leg, stabilizing bars and screws that helped him recover from a devastating car accident just 14 months ago. He was in a hospital bed for three months. His mobility is limited. he is 46
Does he think he could win the Masters this week?
Woods confirmed Tuesday morning the one piece of news that could single-handedly transform the Masters from the year’s first golf major into a mainstream sporting event: after recovering from serious injuries sustained in the February 2021 California car accident he intends to try to do so competing in the Masters starting Thursday where he will be battling for a record-breaking sixth green jacket.
“Right now, I feel like I’m going to play,” Woods said during a 25-minute press conference here. “I’ll play nine more holes tomorrow. My recovery has been good; I was very excited about how I recovered every day.”
Shortly thereafter, the Masters officials released the start times for the first two rounds. Woods will tee off at 10:34 on Thursday, along with South African Louis Oosthuizen and Chilean Joaquín Niemann. This threesome begins on Friday at 1:41 p.m. in the second round.
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Woods’ last tournament was the pandemic-delayed Masters 2020, held in November when he finished 38th. A little over three months later, he suffered comminuted fractures to the tibia and fibula in his right leg after his car went off a road in Southern California, both bones shattering into at least three pieces and piercing the skin. Woods also suffered foot and ankle injuries and said doctors eventually considered amputation.
He said Tuesday he still has leg pain “every day.” His challenges are not only managing that pain, but also resting and recovering enough from each round so he can do it again the next day. When he first showed up in Augusta as a teenager, he was an athletic, flexible force. Now he has to treat his body more like an old man.
“It’s getting excruciating … because of simple things that I would normally just do that would now take a couple hours here and a couple hours there to prepare and then wrap up,” Woods said. “So activity time to do what I want to do, it adds more time on both sides – before and after.”
Which was part of the calculation of whether he could keep up.
“It’s a success that I was able to assert myself here at this point,” said Woods. “Now that I’m here the focus is on getting into the back nine with a chance by Sunday.”
For any of the other 90 players on the field, such an idea would be ridiculous under such circumstances. But over the course of his career, which now spans a quarter of a century – his landmark first Masters triumph came 25 years ago when he was just 21 – Woods has shown a penchant for both the absurdly unexpected and the unbelievably dramatic . He won the 2008 US Open with a broken leg, and his fifth Masters win came in 2019 after undergoing five back surgeries.
Still, he’s probably more familiar with Augusta National than his own backyard. The challenge, he said, won’t be putting the clubface directly on the ball. It will guide its body through Augusta’s hilly, uneven terrain for four and a half hours on four consecutive days.
“I’m good at hitting it,” Woods said. “I have no qualms about what I can physically do from a golf standpoint. Walking is the hard part. … 72 holes is a long way. It’s going to be a tough challenge and one I’m up for.”
When Woods began introducing unprecedented length off the tee more than two decades ago, Augusta responded by lengthening the course. These changes continue to this day – the par 4 tee shot further back this year – and add to the physical demands of the Masters game, even for younger players.
“It’s a very difficult place to walk,” said 28-year-old Justin Thomas, a frequent playing partner of Woods. “It’s the toughest of the year. It’s very, very long, very hilly, lots of long walks back to the tees. … They add that along with some of the craziest waves and terrain of any course we’ll be playing all year, it produces some pretty tired, sore legs by the end of the week.”
The 508 days between tournaments will be the longest hiatus of Wood’s career, surpassing the 466-day hiatus he took between August 2015 and December 2016 to deal with his chronic back problems. Woods then didn’t really compete again until the 2017-18 PGA Tour season, when he had eight top-10 finishes and a memorable season-ending Tour championship win. This was followed by his fifth Masters win in April 2019, which is also his most recent win.
Woods announced Sunday that he would be traveling to Augusta National to train for the second time in five days and that his participation in the Masters was “a game-time decision.” On Monday, he played a practice round with Thomas and fellow Masters player Fred Couples, walking the course with what was said to be a slight limp (Woods is not allowed to use a cart during the tournament). On Tuesday, he did not walk the course and limited his work to the practice grounds before storms ended the practice laps. He said he intends to play nine more holes on Wednesday.
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“I don’t have to worry about hitting balls or playing golf,” Woods said. “I just have to take care of the hills out here. That is the challenge.”
Woods previously said his career as a full-time professional golfer was over because he “couldn’t have predicted that this leg would ever be the way it was.” However, he added that he could see himself playing in PGA Tour events occasionally. In December, he played with Charlie in an unofficial father-son tournament, using a cart to circumvent the Florida course and finishing second to John Daly and his son.
But since he turned professional in 1996, he has been clear about his own claim: when he takes part in a tournament, he expects to win. That seemed audacious to him at 20. But he has never deviated from it – and he is not now.
“If I feel like I can’t,” Woods said, “then you won’t see me out here.”
This is his 24th time here as a player. His five green jackets trail only Jack Nicklaus’ six. He’s the only player who could show up under the circumstances, say the following, and not be laughed out of space.
“I only show up to an event when I think I can win it,” Woods said. “So that’s the attitude I had. There will be a day when it won’t happen and I will know when that will be.”
Woods made it clear on Tuesday: It’s not this week.
Bonesteel reported from Washington.