Tiger Woods storms Pro-Am with two eagles on front nine ahead of long-awaited comeback from injury
TIGER WOODS makes his long-awaited return from injury tomorrow at the Hero World Challenge - and he has been storming his way through a Pro-Am ahead of the tournament.
The 14-time major winner, who has not played competitively for 15 months, shot two eagles on the front nine in a Pro-Am at the course in Albany, the Bahamas.
And he looked happy as Larry to be back playing the sport he dominated for so many years until his game fell apart in the last five or six years - perhaps as he did not shank or pull many balls, and he did not go to grab his back in pain.
It might just be a relaxed Pro-Am ahead of the tournament which starts tomorrow, but the golfing world is getting very excited about the way the current the world number 898 is striking the ball.
The Hero World Challenge is an enticing prospect of an 18-man field with no cut, among song of the world's finest players.
In an earlier news conference, he said: "I’m sitting here in front of you guys with a different reality because things have improved so much.
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“I'm going to try to do the same thing I always do. I'm entered in an event, I'm going to try to win this thing.
“I'm going to be focused. I'm going to do what I can do and put the ball in the correct spots, give myself looks and try to bury these putts, post scores and get myself in that mix come Sunday afternoon.
“I know that's a tall order since I've been away from the game for so long and I've made a lot of different changes in my game, but the mindset's still the same. That is to go out there and try to beat these guys.”
During a practise round yesterday, the 2013 US Open champion and Rio 2016 gold medal winner Justin Rose was impressed with what he saw.
The Englishman took a selfie taken with the former world No 1 Woods, saying afterwards: "We’ve played today in a 20-mph plus breeze and it’s quite an unforgiving wind, but the quality of Tiger’s play has been pretty good.
“‘If Tiger wanted to test his game then these conditions, given as tough as they are, is a good test. He’s clearly driven the ball very, very well."