Nothing, it seems, can stop Tiger Woods. Not bad
greens, late-night baby feedings, a faltering swing, crosstown
traffic ... not even the ghost of Byron Nelson.
Certainly none of his fellow competitors are up to the task. Woods delivered another classic performance at last week's Arnold Palmer Invitational, surviving a back-nine dogfight and seizing the tournament with a walk-off birdie on the 72nd hole.
The latest heroics kept Woods undefeated in 2008, and with his sixth straight worldwide victory dating to last fall he is more than halfway to Nelson's epic record of 11 in a row, set in 1945. Woods is winning with such ease he's making a mockery of how difficult tournament golf really is, or is supposed to be.
"I don't think people in general, and maybe even the average golf fan, can appreciate exactly what Tiger is doing," said Bart Bryant, the runner-up at Bay Hill Club and Lodge in Orlando and a 15-year veteran who has three career Tour victories. "I mean, they appreciate it. I just don't think they understand the magnitude of what he's accomplishing."
The truly frightening thing is that by his own incomparable standards Woods was pretty mediocre for much of last week.
During an even-par 70 first round he struggled with his distance control, hitting only 10 greens in regulation. Among the lowlights were a fatted sand wedge short of the 5th green and a pitching wedge that he blew clear over the 15th green.
"I just didn't hit my irons clean today," Woods said.
It was more of the same on Friday as his swing was off-plane and his nose out of joint. Bay Hill's greens had been ravaged by an infestation of nematodes, voracious little worms that have little respect for golf courses, and the bumpy, inconsistent putting surfaces were particularly vexing to a perfectionist like Woods.
He has dedicated his career to eliminating chance, but at Bay Hill every putt was a crapshoot, and for two days it seemed to drain some of Woods's usual intensity. On the greens he wore an exasperated smile throughout a second-round 68, which left him languishing in 20th place, seven behind leader Vijay Singh, a longtime antagonist. Of course, Tiger never stops fighting, and following the round he said, "I'll do some work tonight and probably do a little work tomorrow morning, and I'll be all right."
With that Woods lit out of Bay Hill and weaved through a few miles of traffic back to his lair in the Isleworth community, where he could grind on his game in seclusion. (Construction of Woods's dream house is about to begin at his $44.5 million compound on the east coast of Florida, on Jupiter Island.) Among Woods's many gifts is a knack for self-diagnosis. Says his instructor, Hank Haney, "He knows his swing so well that he can almost always fix it on his own."
A startling example of this came last month at the Dubai Desert Classic. After Woods had chopped his way to a third-round 73, during which he visited groves of palm trees, patches of desert sand and, on the final hole, a water hazard, he cured himself by working on the range and then in front of a mirror in his hotel room.
Certainly none of his fellow competitors are up to the task. Woods delivered another classic performance at last week's Arnold Palmer Invitational, surviving a back-nine dogfight and seizing the tournament with a walk-off birdie on the 72nd hole.
The latest heroics kept Woods undefeated in 2008, and with his sixth straight worldwide victory dating to last fall he is more than halfway to Nelson's epic record of 11 in a row, set in 1945. Woods is winning with such ease he's making a mockery of how difficult tournament golf really is, or is supposed to be.
"I don't think people in general, and maybe even the average golf fan, can appreciate exactly what Tiger is doing," said Bart Bryant, the runner-up at Bay Hill Club and Lodge in Orlando and a 15-year veteran who has three career Tour victories. "I mean, they appreciate it. I just don't think they understand the magnitude of what he's accomplishing."
The truly frightening thing is that by his own incomparable standards Woods was pretty mediocre for much of last week.
During an even-par 70 first round he struggled with his distance control, hitting only 10 greens in regulation. Among the lowlights were a fatted sand wedge short of the 5th green and a pitching wedge that he blew clear over the 15th green.
"I just didn't hit my irons clean today," Woods said.
It was more of the same on Friday as his swing was off-plane and his nose out of joint. Bay Hill's greens had been ravaged by an infestation of nematodes, voracious little worms that have little respect for golf courses, and the bumpy, inconsistent putting surfaces were particularly vexing to a perfectionist like Woods.
He has dedicated his career to eliminating chance, but at Bay Hill every putt was a crapshoot, and for two days it seemed to drain some of Woods's usual intensity. On the greens he wore an exasperated smile throughout a second-round 68, which left him languishing in 20th place, seven behind leader Vijay Singh, a longtime antagonist. Of course, Tiger never stops fighting, and following the round he said, "I'll do some work tonight and probably do a little work tomorrow morning, and I'll be all right."
With that Woods lit out of Bay Hill and weaved through a few miles of traffic back to his lair in the Isleworth community, where he could grind on his game in seclusion. (Construction of Woods's dream house is about to begin at his $44.5 million compound on the east coast of Florida, on Jupiter Island.) Among Woods's many gifts is a knack for self-diagnosis. Says his instructor, Hank Haney, "He knows his swing so well that he can almost always fix it on his own."
A startling example of this came last month at the Dubai Desert Classic. After Woods had chopped his way to a third-round 73, during which he visited groves of palm trees, patches of desert sand and, on the final hole, a water hazard, he cured himself by working on the range and then in front of a mirror in his hotel room.
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