Host Woods let down by putter in opening round  PGATOUR.com Chief of Correspondents BETHESDA, Md. -- The easy part was playing golf again. Once he got inside the ropes, though, Tiger Woods was decidedly un-easy standing over his putts.  Tiger Woods is seven shots behind the lead at Congressional. (WireImage)
The result was an uncharacteristic 3-over 73 in the first round of the AT&T National, which Woods is hosting and helped organize in 116 days. And suddenly, the game's No. 1 player --- and father of two-and-a-half weeks --- is in danger of missing the cut. Woods set the tone for the day when he three-putted the first hole for bogey and was unable to get up and down from a greenside bunker at the par-3 second. He fought back --- even getting to 1 under with a birdie at the 12th hole --- before making bogeys on four of his last six holes. "I never got the speed right," said Woods, who used 34 putts and ranked 109th in that category. "All of my putts I missed were short ?? way short, actually. It was a struggle. "Towards the end there I tried to actually place some iron shots above the holes to at least make it a little bit easier because I just struggled. I just struggled hitting the putts hard enough." Woods' daughter Sam Alexis was born the day after he tied for second at the U.S. Open at Oakmont, where you barely had to touch the ball to get it to the hole. He admitted he didn't practice his putting as much as he probably should have "and unfortunately it showed up glaringly." Woods planned to remedy the situation on the practice green Thursday afternoon, though. He'll face a daunting tee shot over a lake to the par-3 10th hole when he tees off at 8:25 on Friday morning. "I'll have to figure something out, different strokes, stances to get the ball to the hole," Woods said. "I'll have to figure something out for tomorrow, because evidently what I'm doing is not even close to being right. "So I've got to fix it, I've got to get back in this tournament to give myself a chance." Woods starts the second round in a tie for 77th, seven strokes behind the leaders -- Joe Ogilvie, K.J. Choi, Jim Furyk, Stuart Appleby and Vijay Singh. He's clearly focused on making up ground, not yielding any more on Friday.
"There's a bunch of guys up there right now, and I've got three rounds," Woods said. "I can't get them in one. It's going to have to be over three, and hopefully I can be there in the end." Woods has been gratified by the crowds -- 18,000 attended Thursday's first round -- and he's confident of raising "pretty significant charitable dollars" toward building a Tiger Woods Learning Center on the East Coast by week's end. Switching gears from host to hunter on Thursday wasn't difficult, though. "Actually, that was the easy part, getting out there and playing," Woods said. "The other responsibilities, that's something that you don't normally do. "Once I got back inside the ropes and started playing again, I got back into my comfort level and felt at peace going there and competing." |
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