Puttergoescold,Woodsstruggles
After Friday's barrage of misreads, short misses and rim-outs on greens he could not figure out, might want to go back to his old putter. And find a new sand wedge while he's at it.
Woods, who got under par on Day 1 of the PGA Championship by swapping his usual putter for one that was a little longer, ended up in a battle simply to make the cut in the second round. He shot 2-over 72 to finish at even par at the midway point at Harding Park. He is eight shots behind leader Haotong Li.
Most of the problems had to do with his putting.
"I really struggled with getting the speed of the greens today," he said. "They looked faster than what they were putting. They were firm coming into the greens, but they weren't putting as fast as they looked. And then as the day wore on, they got a little more fuzzy and got even slower." On Day 1, he made 141 feet worth of putts. On Day 2, the grand total was 52 feet, and that was with the help of 12 footer on No. 16 that looked more like 50 considering the way the rest of the round had gone.
The rough putting day contributed to an 0-for-5 performance in the sand-save category, which brought him to 0 for 7 for the tournament.
A day that began with legitimate thoughts of Woods capturing his 16th major ended with him needing to play the last three holes at even par or better simply to make the cut.
With a freshly inked contract extension in his back pocket, an inspired Valtteri Bottas got the bit between his teeth to beat Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton to pole position, as super sub Nico Hulkenberg took a remarkable third for the 70th Anniversary Grand Prix at Silverstone.
The Finn set the pace in every single segment of qualifying, but was on the backfoot after the first runs in Q3 as Hamilton sauntered to the top of the timesheets. But Bottas refused to be rattled and while Hamilton improved again on his next effort, this time the Finn had an answer.
This was his 13th career pole position and sets him up nicely for the second successive race at Silverstone, having suffered the misery of a tyre deflation last time out when running second, with the Finn likely to be buoyed by the fact he has won the last two races he has started from P1.
But the most impressive performance came from pink car of Nico Hulkenberg. The German was parachuted in to replace Sergio Perez, following the Mexican’s positive test for Covid 19, last weekend but failed to take the race start because of an engine issue. This weekend has been much smoother, with Hulkenberg comfortably beating regular race driver and team mate Stroll in all segments of qualifying.
Hamilton appeared on course to take his 92nd career pole but he had a poor first sector on his final run and Bottas clocked 1 minute, 25.154 seconds, 0.063 seconds ahead of the six-time world champion.
It gave Bottas his first pole since the opening race of the pandemic-delayed season in Austria, which he went on to win.
Hamilton won the next three races from pole, including last weekend in the British GP, to extend his championship lead over Bottas to 30 points in his quest for a record-equaling seventh world title.
F1 is back at Hamilton's home circuit of Silverstone this weekend for a race also closed to spectators due to the coronavirus restrictions.
"I wasn't that great," Hamilton said. "But Valtteri did a good job and deserved pole." Bottas signed a one-year Mercedes contract extension earlier this week.
"The race pace is there," Bottas said. "So the first job is to get a good start off the line (on Sunday)." Nico Hulkenberg took an impressive third in his role as Sergio Perez's replacement at Racing Point. Perez remains sidelined with the coronavirus and Hulkenberg was the only driver within one second of the Mercedes drivers.
The German driver qualified 13th last week but failed to start the race following a car failure.
"It has been a crazy seven or eight days," he said. "Last week, we had the high of the comeback and then the low of not starting on Sunday.
"I felt more prepared this week. I am surprised to stand here but there is a big smile on my face." Max Verstappen took fourth ahead of Renault's Daniel Ricciardo with Lance Stroll sixth for Racing Point.
Sebastian Vettel's poor form in his Ferrari left him in 12th after the four-time world champion finished 10th in last Sunday's race.
"It was all I had," Vettel said over the team radio.
"It was all I could get from this car. I tried."
Vettel was signed by Ferrari to end its barren run of world championships, which extends to Kimi Raikkonen in 2007. He is leaving at the end of the season with Charles Leclerc, who qualified in eighth, identified as the team's star of the future.
Lando Norris heads into his second home race in as many weeks in fourth spot in the championship and he will start from 10th. McLaren teammate Carlos Sainz, who will replace Vettel at Ferrari in 2021, finished 13th with Norris 4-1 up on the Spaniard in qualifying this season.
George Russell extended his unbeaten qualifying head-to-head with Williams teammate Nicholas Latifi to 5-0 after he was 15th, three places ahead of the rookie Canadian.
Giuseppe Farina drove an Alfa Romeo to victory at Formula One's first world championship race, here at Silverstone 70 years ago.
But the Italian team will see both drivers line up on the last row of the grid for Sunday's landmark race, with Antonio Giovinazzi and Raikkonen 19th and 20th.