Seeing Woods from th
Tiger revels in this latest triumphant twist ahead of Le Golf National showdown
IT was quite a sight wasn’t it? The delirious, unrestrained ranks that spilled on to the 18th fairway at East Lake on Sunday to carry Tiger Woods to the final green of the Tour Championship on a veritable tsunami of triumphalism was like those clips from Open Championships of yore when a single R&A official with a brolly would try to hold back a tide of jubilation, flared troosers and lambchop sideburns.
This latest twist in the Tiger tale was such an epic production, it should have been directed by DeMille. He was the people’s champion, a moniker you would’ve struggled to give him back in his steely, machine-like pomp.
This implausible redemption for Woods in his 80th PGA Tour title, and a first since 2013, generated such a rousing reverberation it just about broke the Richter Scale.
It wasn’t that long ago, amid a series of downbeat updates and grim prognoses on the state of his back, that many were expecting the next bulletin to be Woods’s official retirement.
Now, he’s even got the man who holds the major-winning tally of 18 worrying that his record could yet be broken by the resurgent 42-year-old.
“Maybe Tiger’s got another 40 majors to play,” said Jack Nicklaus of the 14-time winner Woods after this hugely significant victory. “Out of 40 majors, can he win five of them? He’s playing well enough.”
For Woods, the sense of satisfaction was obvious. “I’ve been sitting on 79 for about five years now and to get 80 is a pretty damned good feeling,” he said. “Just to be able to compete and play again this year, that’s a hell of a comeback.
“Some of the people very close to me, they’ve seen what I’ve gone through. Some of the players have seen what I’ve gone through, and they know how hard it was just to get back to playing golf again, forget the elite level. Just be able to play golf again and enjoy being with my kids and living that life. And then, lo and behold, I’m able to do this and win a golf tournament.
“Probably the low point was not knowing if I’d ever be able to live pain-free. Am I going to be able to sit, stand, walk, lay down without feeling the pain that I was in? I just didn’t want to live that way. This is how the rest of my life is going to be? It’s going to be a tough rest of my life.
“And so I was beyond playing. I couldn’t sit. I couldn’t
‘‘ The people very close to me have seen what I’ve gone through
walk. I couldn’t lay down without feeling the pain in my back and my leg. That was a pretty low point for a very long time.”
There’s no rest for the winner’s in this game, of course, and Woods has travelled to Paris for this week’s Ryder Cup. If his appearance at the event even before his victory had ramped up the interest factor, the mouth-frothing will now be at fevered levels.
“I think the weekend was a pretty good introduction into the Ryder Cup,” said Woods with great understatement.
As far as Team America is concerned, the captain, Jim Furyk, must feel like he has added a howitzer to his armoury.
The visitors will be trying to win the Ryder Cup on European soil for the first time since 1993. After performing, and revelling in, his role as a vice-captain in 2016 at Hazeltine, there is a feeling that Woods’ regard for the Ryder Cup has