It’s been a while since Tiger Woods has had much to crow about at a golf tournament.
Even the lone bogey at the last on Thursday couldn’t wipe the smile off his face after a very impressive opening 65 at the Chevron World Challenge.
Though the 66 he shot at Pebble Beach on the Saturday of the U.S. Open was far more important and the Ryder Cup demolition of Francesco Molinari more compelling, this was easily his most complete performance of the year.
“I really striped it, hit a lot of good shots,” Woods said.
“It's not too often you can say, ’I shot 65 and only made one putt,’ but that's kind of what I did today.
“I only made one putt and it was on 9. The rest were either two-putts (for birdie) or kick-ins. It was a good ball-striking day.”
Sounds just like the Tiger of old; seven under par and still incredulous that every putt he hit didn’t fall.
He did, in fairness, have 32 putts. In comparison, second-placed Rory McIlroy, who shot six under par, had just 26 putts on the slick Sherwood Country Club greens.
There was a certain symmetry to Woods’ play on a pristine afternoon; the last time he led a tournament by himself was at the Australian Masters in November 2009, which was also his last win.
Perhaps not coincidentally, that was also the last time Woods played before his life descended into tabloid hell.
He came to Southern California this week hoping for a fresh start; wanting to put the past behind him.
But words alone won’t bury the past; he needs to produce days like this to make it easier for people to forget.
Whether Woods can keep the momentum going is another matter.
He was a co-leader after the first round of The Barclays in New Jersey in August, triggering headlines that the sport’s fallen superstar was back.
Instead, a wicked pull hook out-of-bounds to begin his second round at Ridgewood Country Club was the harbinger of the exasperation to come.
But things may be different this time.
Woods was, then, both freshly divorced — still working out the details of his children’s living arrangements — and trying to digest the new swing patterns he was learning from Sean Foley.
Four months later, his domestic life has some normalcy and he’s far more adept at turning Foley’s theories into straight and long golf shots.
I asked another of Foley’s students, Hunter Mahan, who played some practice holes with Woods on Tuesday, whether he noticed anything different in the former world No. 1.
“Yeah,” he said, “He didn’t look like he was thinking. He was just swinging.”
Steve Stricker, who’s played more golf with Woods than anyone over the past few years, had a ringside seat Thursday.
The straight-shooting world No. 5 isn’t one given to hyperbole.
“He looked pretty darned good to me,” said Stricker, who shot an even-par 72.
“He hit a lot of great golf shots and he’s hitting it solid. Really compressing it. And he’s got his distance back.”
Part of the Woods mystique was his power off the tee; in his youth he intimidated competitors with his length.
But there’s been attrition in his power game over a number of years. On the evidence of Thursday’s tee shots, that process could be reversing.
“How far does he hit his 3-wood?” someone asked Stricker.
“It goes further than my driver,” he joked.
Except, strictly speaking, he wasn’t joking: Woods was routinely blasting 3-woods off the tee beyond Stricker’s driver and only some of that may be down to the Wisconsin rust — he’s had seven weeks off — on Stricker’s game.
“I was pretty impressed with what he was doing out there today.”
Woods wasn’t ready to proclaim himself back, preferring the cautious tack he’s adopted since starting to work with Foley in August.
“It’s a process,” he said. “I was putting together streaks of holes earlier, two, three, four five holes of this, then I’d lose it for a little bit.”
“Today was a full round, so that’s a good start.”
What was also different about Thursday’s round is that when Woods made a poor swing, on the par-3 12th, he recovered with that old Tiger magic that’s been MIA this year.
“That was a bad spot, a bad leave,” he said of his tee shot, “You can’t miss it long there, and I did.”
The flop to a few feet was, he said with a broad grin, “a sweet little shot.”
The importance of saving par wasn’t lost on Woods.
“Most of this year if I did get something going, I’d make some kind of mistake and leave myself in a bad spot and make bogey,” he said.
Friday, then, looms as a big day for Woods.
Does he have back-to-back low rounds in him?
