Tiger Woods’s return to competitive golf after a year out through injury resulted in a tie for the 23rd at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines.
The former world No.1 made the cut by just one shot, making a birdie on the final hole to squeeze into the weekend with rounds of 72 and 71, and then he followed that up with rounds of 70 and 72 for a three-under-par total for the week.
Woods was wayward with the driver throughout the week, finding only nine fairways over the final three rounds in windy conditions at the California course, but his short game remained in good order and his scrambling was good enough for an encouraging top-30 finish.
Despite his woeful driving stats, Woods was proud of his fighting spirit throughout the week, and declared himself happy with his overall performance as he looks to put together a positive build-up towards the Masters in April.
“I’m very pleased,” he said. “After not playing for a couple of years, to come out here on the Tour and really play a solid four days, I fought hard for these scores and I’m excited to get this one under my belt.”
Woods underwent spinal fusion surgery last year, his fourth major operation on his back, and he was delighted with how his body held up over the tournament. “Overall I thought I did pretty well this week,” he added. “For some of the shots I had to hit out of the rough and out of the trees, I had to jack up the speed and had no physical issues at all. I hadn’t played out of rye grass since last year, but I hit some really good ones out of there. Unfortunately I put myself in there a lot. These are some of the narrowest fairways on tour and when I don’t have my best stuff, and when it’s so windy, it compounded it. It made it very difficult for me.”
Woods has not yet committed to any another tournaments after the Genesis Open, but said: “I haven’t built out my schedule. We want to see how I was swinging after one tournament and reassess where I’m at.”