On Sunday, Sept. 23, 2018, Tiger Woods claimed his 80th PGA win, which is his first PGA win in five years. Woods’ birdied at his first hole on Sunday, which set the mood for the remainder of the day.
It was at the FedEx Cup playoffs in September of 2013 that Woods fell to his knees from back pain. This back pain caused Woods to seek treatment which lead to four back surgeries, and more specifically a fusion surgery in 2017.
This specific fusion surgery that Woods underwent targeted the base of his spine, which was where his pain stemmed from. From the base of his spine a surgeon went in and removed a disk, placed a metal cage around his bone graft and then realigned his vertebrae to relieve the pressure from his pinched nerve roots.
With the fusion surgery being as extensive as it was, the future of Woods’ golf career was in a state of uncertainty. Neither he, nor his surgeon could be sure that he would ever be able to swing a golf club like he had before, and without pain.
After playing a sport for over 20 years an athlete develops a style of play. Woods had to not only rebuild and rehab his body, he also had to relearn his swing technique.
December of last year was Woods’ first appearance back to the professional golf world, seven months after his fusion surgery, and not having played since the February prior. The event was the Hero World Challenge which was an unofficial PGA Tour event but still held importance to players.
Woods walked into the Hero World Challenge ranked 1,199th in the Official World Golf Rankings. With a ranking that low his chances of success in 2018 were not very high. Not to mention, Woods was 42 years old and had not played in any major golf tournaments in two years.
Shortly after the Hero World Challenge was the start of the official PGA Tour, the Farmers Insurance Open in January 2018. From here on out Woods had to start from the bottom up, which is not something he is used to doing. Woods is an athlete who has been playing a professional sport for almost two decades and has been at the top level for those two.
However, Woods was able to gain his form back and finish top-10 in six tournaments, two of which were The Open and PGA Championship.
After the Farmers Insurance Open his World Golf Ranking had grown to 539 and continued to grow to now being ranked 13th overall after winning the PGA Tour this past Sunday.
Golf professional Jack Nicklaus complimented and congratulated Woods via Twitter by saying: “I never dreamed @TigerWoods could come back and swing the way he has, after surgery. I think you could argue he’s swinging better than he has ever in his life. He has played fantastically!”
Next on Woods list of events is the Ryder Cup which will be held this weekend, Sept. 28-30 in France. With Woods’ success in the winning of the PGA Tour this past weekend he is now favored to win the Masters next year.
Lindsey Elam
Reporter