"After racing ahead of Tiger on the 11th fairway, I gave Ron, my assistant at the Masters, the 400mm lens to hold along with the 600mm and told him I'd be back. I then headed up the rope line to a tree about 15 yards in front of Tiger's ball. I figured the tree would act as a bit of cover and Tiger might not have to move me.

His ball was nestled in the needles close to another tree just inside the ropes, too tight for a regular swing. Tiger started to figure out how to play his shot (1). He checked his yardage and cleared out some people he felt were too close to his play (2). I think he was worried about breaking the club and having it hit a patron. He thought about hitting it lefty (3). He directed some more folks (4), picked a club and settled in for the shot.

I did not have time to check any exposures because I didn't want to miss any of the things Tiger was doing leading up to the shot. My only concern was whether I would be able to see Tiger's face or not. I wanted to shoot just a hair late to try and capture the explosion of the needles and the club on the tree. Too early and the impact would be too clean.

Whack! (5) Pine needles, dirt, pebbles and squirrel teeth fly. Forest shrapnel is everywhere. I can hear it blow by me. The crowd gasps then roars. Tiger walks toward the rope and ... picks up his bent club. He cranks it until it snaps in two and hands it to a course marshal (6).

I head down to my assistant and we weave through the crowd to a photo pen down by the 12th green. Tiger's shot out of the woods was fabulous, right to the front of the green. He went on to save par and I had a lucky score that wound up being the SI cover shot that week.