Woods forthright about neck injury
DEREK LAWRENSON
TIGER WOODS spoke openly yesterday about the neck injury that caused him to pull out of the Arnold Palmer Invitational last week — and admitted it was something he was going to have to manage for the rest of his career.
‘It’s a consequence of the fact that I now have a fused back, and that the stress has to go somewhere,’ he said. ‘Even though the lower back is now fixed, one of the issues of that procedure is there’s no movement down there, and so it’s very important for me going forward to keep all the other structures pliable and that I stay as loose as I possibly can.
‘I have to accept I’m 43 with four back surgeries and four knee surgeries, that I’m going to have good weeks and bad weeks and I can’t push it anymore. I did that a few times earlier in my career, won a few tournaments, but I also cost myself a few years.’
Woods first felt the injury at the Genesis Open last month, where the weather played havoc with the schedule and he was forced to play a lot of holes in a short space of time.
‘It then got worse playing in Mexico two weeks later to the point where it was affecting my set-up, my backswing and my putting, and I knew I had to take last week off,’ he said.
Woods declared himself painfree for the moment and ready to play this week in the PGA Tour’s flagship event, the Players Championship.
Before his news conference he played nine holes and certainly appeared to be swinging the club without restriction. He was upbeat regarding his preparations for the Masters in four weeks, although he could offer no update on whether he will play again before Augusta.
‘Let’s see how this week goes, and whether there’s any flare-up,’ he said. ‘If there isn’t, I’ll play one more. I’m happy regarding Augusta. I was always only going to play four or five events before the Masters and this is my fourth. I feel like everything is headed on track towards April.’
When Woods has played this year, the one recurring theme is that his good play from tee to green has been undermined by some untypically poor putting.
Interestingly, then, for a man who likes to work it all out for himself these days, he had a specialist putting coach, Matt Killen overseeing his stroke yesterday. ‘Because I’ve been struggling with my posture through my neck injury my putting has been off, and I wanted to listen to what Matt had to say because he’s seen my stroke enough over the years and he’s very knowledgeable,’ explained Tiger. ‘It was helpful listening to him. As I’ve started to feel better physically, the putting has definitely freed up.’ Woods will tee off in the first round alongside defending champion Webb Simpson and Masters champion Patrick Reed. While Woods has finished 20th, 15th and 10th in his three tournaments so far this season, world No2 Justin Rose comes into the week on the back of some uncharacteristically poor form. Rose won the Farmers Insurance Open in January but then missed the cut in Saudi Arabia and could only finish 63rd at Bay Hill last week after rounds of 77 and 75 over the weekend.
‘It was a tough weekend,’ he admitted. “I thought I was in a good position after two rounds and with a good score on Saturday and Sunday you can run through the field.
‘Everything was a little off, I didn’t read the greens well so there’s a few things to work on, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. (Having) four weeks off was always going to be designed to not necessarily play well at Bay Hill, it’s designed to kick into effect in a few weeks’ time.
‘It was a week I just had to go through and sometimes finishing 63rd is a wake-up call too, just gives you that little bit of extra intensity coming into this week to make you realise the game isn’t easy and you’ve got to put in the work and tick all the boxes to prepare.’