Tiger Woods wants to start at the US Masters in Augusta

The Gulfstream jet, which took off from a Florida airport a week ago on Tuesday morning, immediately excited the interested public. Because the radar freaks who use their computers to track the movement of aircraft in the airspace over America also include sports fans. And they not only know who owns the machine with the registration number N517TW. They also guessed where the journey was going. To Augusta, the venue of the US Masters.

A little later, the rumors were confirmed. Tiger Woods flew in to see if he was fit enough to take part in the world’s most prestigious golf tournament. But he was not ready to make a clear statement for the time being.

However, his mere presence was enough to spark the never-ending Tiger mania and pushed the ambitions of the 90 other participants in the traditional competition into the background. The important questions only revolved around the 46-year-old, who was seriously injured in a car accident in California 14 months ago. Is he playing? Doesn’t he play?

The comeback in Augusta would be a rendezvous with the past

Those responsible for the tournament gave an official answer on Tuesday of this week when they announced the tee times for the first round. Accordingly, Tiger Woods will set off at 10:34 am on Thursday alongside South African Louis Oosthuizen and Chilean Joaquín Niemann to tackle the 18 holes in the rolling pine grove off Washington Road.

However, that is not entirely certain. Woods only wants to compete if he feels strong enough. Because the claim of the man whose star rose here exactly 25 years ago with the first of five Masters victories is as high as ever. And significantly higher than the opponents. They’re happy to be there at all. Woods made this clear again at the media conference on Tuesday: “If I have the feeling that I can still win, I will play. But if I feel like I can’t, you won’t see me here.”

The reason for the reservation: He has no problems with the game itself, with the power he needs for his powerful shots, with the precision of the ball flight and the accuracy of his putts on the greens. No: “The walking is the hard part.”

What remained after the car accident was a slight limp

After the accident, Woods was hospitalized for weeks and was unable to even walk for months. He later let it be known that he was lucky to have survived the crash that he himself was responsible for. The rehab period was tough, and for a long time it was impossible to predict when he would return to golf.

A slight limp remained. Fred Couples, Masters winner from 1992 and still eligible because of this success in Augusta, observed this closely on a joint practice lap on Monday, but he did not find the handicap particularly remarkable. “He looks good the way he’s running,” he said, adding that Woods “never shows he’s in pain” and that his punches are spot on. “This guy is just amazing.”

The chorus of younger professionals sounded similarly impressed. Not only the American Billy Horschel, the world number 13, was amazed: “With everything he’s been through, with all the injuries and with all the personal things, he still has the drive and the fire to play golf.” His compatriot, four-time major winner Brooks Koepka, pointed out how important Woods’ attitude is to the radiance of the sport: “We need him, the game needs him, everyone needs him, the fans need him.” And the American Patrick Cantlay specified: “The tournaments he competes in definitely feel different.”

We’ve known that for a long time because Woods has struggled with knee and back injuries for most of his career, has had to go under the knife several times and has been out repeatedly. But even a stiffening of the spine in the lumbar region could not slow him down. In 2019, after an eleven-year dry spell, he won his 15th major tournament with the US Masters.

The rotational forces of his energetic golf swing had caused massive wear and tear and he had to resort to strong painkillers with side effects. In 2017, for example, there was an encounter with the police not far from his house in Florida, when he was found in his car at night and was processed by the police. The resulting photo showed a staring man who had lost control of his life.

Even the sex scandal didn’t throw him off track for a long time

But that was not the end of his career, nor was the sex scandal that forced him to make a public confession in 2010. The performance was stilted and ill-rehearsed, and could have come straight from a textbook on forced self-incriminations of the kind seen in show trials in communist countries. But the confession and months of treatment in a rehab clinic for his sex addiction helped. What would have thrown other top athletes completely off course only led to a longer break in his case.

He used the time to catch his breath and to prepare for the next attack on the world leaders. At that time, too, he had fallen deeply in the world rankings, today his name can only be found in 973rd place – even behind the best Swiss, Jeremy Freiburghaus (695). But even at his advanced age, Woods should not be underestimated. A few top rankings are enough and he’s back in the top hundred.

Is it enough to win in Augusta? That is very unlikely. To do this, a world-class professional has to consistently play extraordinarily well for four days in a row. However, if you believe him capable of that, you should probably bet on it. The odds at American bookmakers for a Tiger win are 50:1.