Is Tiger really a tortured soul ...or is he just a lousy driver?

TIGER WOODS had an accident. Sometimes there is such a thing. Not all actions have motives, no matter Freudian analysis. A cigar is sometimes just a cigar. A car crash is just a car crash.

Although not for Woods, it seems.

Every event in his life must be commandeered to peer into his soul. Is he happy, is he troubled, was he high, was he on pills, is this a cry for help, is it the end?

Imagine what he could have achieved were it not for his father/ his private life/ the girls/ the drugs.

Then again, maybe he was in a rush, he was driving too fast, he misjudged the bend, he got distracted. Fortunately, no- one else was hurt. Sadly, he was.

Speculation about the athlete, we can understand. It would be a terrible pity if his competitive career concluded in this haphazard way. Yet the man? What has this to do with the man? From documentary makers to biographers and writers, Woods has lived his life amid ceaseless speculation about his motivations.

The same raddled mugshot is pulled out at every turn to make it appear his is an existence of misery. Yet what if it’s been a blast being the greatest golfer in the world? What if all of the issues that are supposed to add up to a tortured soul in a totalled SUV were, in fact, nothing of the sort?

That Woods’ repentance for past sins was necessary to satisfy his corporate backers but the way he lived was a choice, not a curse.

Commentators consider the player Woods might have been, the heights he could have reached,

had he only led a more structured life. But who wants to sit alone in a hotel room, contemplating the 140 or so guys waiting to take a chunk out of you on the tee the next morning?

the company Woods sought might have taken that edge off. mindy Lawton, a local waitress, revealed a call from Woods at 5.30am before leaving for a tournament.

‘He wanted that last piece of booty before he could go,’ she said, ‘to make him shoot better.’

this, apparently, was tiger in hell. Yet was it? the reason his private life held such fascination when it fell apart was precisely because he had succeeded in staying guarded. He called his yacht Privacy.

and, as the great unravelling began with a car crash, great significance has been afforded this one, too. Yet maybe it was no more than it seems. a misjudgement, of space, of speed, of a crowded personal itinerary.

‘He’s not Superman,’ snapped rory mcilroy, asked about Woods’ return. indeed he’s not. He may just be a lousy driver. Sometimes, as Freud didn’t say, there’s no more to it than that.