Wild Woods a work in progress as Noren leads

la jolla — Tiger Woods knows it will take time to fine-tune his swing as he plays his way back towards tournament toughness on the PGA Tour.

Woods, however, showed there is nothing wrong with his short game as he overcame a wild driving display to shoot two-under-par 70 in the third round at the Farmers Insurance Open on Saturday.

In his first official tournament in 51 weeks, since a spinal fusion last April, he struggled to find any rhythm with his swing, missing all but three fairways, several by wide margins.

The 14-times major champion described his performance as “gross”, even though he produced some brilliant recovery shots and ran the tables on the greens on the Torrey Pines South course, where he has won eight times.

Woods will start the final round equal 39th, out of contention but clearly looking forward to getting another competitive round under his belt.

“Hey, I’ll have another day in this whole process of trying to build my way back up,” he said after posting a three-under 213 total, eight strokes behind Swedish leader Alex Noren.

“I didn’t have much but I fought and put up a score and made some putts. It’s just fighting and grinding. I tried as hard as I possibly could.”

Noren sank a 40-footer to eagle the par-five sixth and added a tap-in birdie at the par-five 18th to card 69 and edge ahead on a crowded leaderboard.

The Swede heads Ryan Palmer (73) by a stroke and is two in front of JB Holmes and Michael Kim. Spanish defending champion Jon Rahm double-bogeyed the last to fall four behind. — Reuters