Tiger on prowl as top form returns
Tiger Woods did not get to gaze at his name commanding the top rung of a leaderboard once more, but everyone in golf – and many more beyond – did not miss out on the magical sight.
Indeed, as the 14-time major winner moved to five-under and the outright lead at the PGA tour’s Valspar Championship in Florida yesterday, a frisson burst through the sport.
The game was transported back in time as Woods, despite a final-hole bogey that slipped him into a tie for second on fourunder, two shots behind Canadian rookie Corey Conners. This was no fluke, no dead-cat bounce. In fact, after his 12th place at the Honda Classic two weeks ago, this should have been expected.
But still, it seemed surreal after all the 42-year-old has gone through in the last year, if not the last decade since the last of his 14 major wins. This was only his 12th competitive round since his make-or-break spinal fusion last May, but he outscored both of his playing partners, Henrik Stenson and Jordan Spieth, by nine strokes over the first two rounds.
‘‘Today was a good day,’’ Woods said. ‘‘I’m in with a chance to win on the weekend.’’
Whatever happens in the next two days, or at the Arnold Palmer next week, Woods is going to be a huge story, possibly the story at the Masters in four weeks. Golf really could be on the brink of one of its most staggering storylines.
After winning his first event in five years at the WGC Mexico last week, Phil Mickelson quipped that he expected Woods to break his own five-year void this week, ‘‘just to one-up me again’’. That possibility was put into stark focus when he birdied the second (his 11th) and fifth (his 14th) to grab the solo lead.
It was a big moment, but Woods missed it. ‘‘I never got a chance,’ he said, explaining that the screens around the green did not show the scoreboard.
He gave a fist pump when holing a 12-footer on the seventh, but his stellar run could not last on the ninth to finish with a 68.