Tiger Woods masters the driving range, but will barely be able to walk 72 holes

Tiger Woods could win the US Masters in a canter if they let him use a motorized cart. At 8.14am, he’s on the billiard-table driving range.

Tiger Woods of the United States and Will Zalatoris of the United States during a practice round prior to the 2024 Masters Tournament at Augusta, Georgia. Picture: Maddie Meyer/Getty Images

Tiger Woods is zipping around Amen Corner. Well, limping. He birdies the 11th hole. Which is called White Dogwood. He stiffs his tee shot and birdies the 12th hole. Which is called Golden Bell. He monsters two gorgeous strokes to reach the stupefyingly picturesque green on the 13th hole. Which is called Azalea. He makes a half-baked attempt at the eagle putt. Picks up. We’ll give him a birdie on Azalea.

Woods could win the US Masters in a canter if they let him use a motorized cart. At 8.14am, he’s on the billiard-table driving range.

The 48-year-old still hits the ball to the moon and back - cuts, fades, draws, zingers, a Harlem Globetrotter of a golfer – but actually getting around Augusta National Golf Club is problematic enough to warrant a walking stick. He’s slim, broad-shouldered and seemingly in sparkling nick for a 48-year-old until he tries to move.

There’s no canter here, no trot, barely a walk. More a slow, rolling, awkward, painful gait of a gnarled old Texas cowboy. You’re tempted to offer him a fireman’s carry across Hogan Bridge.

He’s been through so many surgeries, to so many body parts, so many times, that he aches and creaks and groans while taking an eternity to simply pluck the ball from the hole. He nearly needs one of those suction cup things on the end of his putter like the old blokes use to retrieve balls at your local club; he may arrive on the next tee on all fours. “My ankle doesn’t move,” he says. “So something’s going to take the stress. I mean, the stress is going to transfer somewhere else.”

Everywhere else, by the look of him. The five-time Masters champion and 15-times major winner is paired with Will Zalatoris for a practice round. The patrons are packed 20-deep, 30-deep, 40-deep. They’re roaring for Woods. Following him like an ant colony in pursuit of a bread crumb. Caddies in white jumpsuits are crawling all over the course, too, getting yardages on this and that, measuring the distance between here and there. It’s 125 yards from this bunker to the pin and E=MC2. One of the caddies is Cam Smith’s looper, Sam Pinfold, suggesting The Open champion is no longer crook as Tobruk and is certain to play.

There’s been doubt about Woods’ appearance at the National. At least he’s here, in the flesh, going birdie, birdie, give-him-a-birdie around Amen Corner despite the debilitating troubles with hip, back, knee and ankle. He hasn’t walked properly since he nearly needed a leg amputation after a car crash in 2021 broke umpteen bones in both legs and feet.

“For the past couple months, he’s been trying to find a way to recover,” says his mate Notah Begay III. “He can play the golf. We always knew the question was going to be, ‘Can he walk the 72 holes?’ That’s still up in the air.

“Can he recover, from one round to the next? That’s the biggest question. He’s trying to formulate a strategy and approach that he can work within given the constraints that he’s presented with. And he’s got some constraints. He’s got zero mobility in his left ankle and really has low-back challenges now.”

Woods is the Masters’ out-and-out mega star. He’s also an out-and-out outsider at 150-1. He’s is whisked away after his round by enough security for the president. Zalatoris says: “He showed me a couple of little things around the course. At the same time, I let him do what he does and I just kind of followed him around. Just everything the guy has done, you could just sit there and analyse the stats for his entire career and put him in five different buckets and every one of them is never going to be broken.”

Zalatoris adds: “He played great. He outdrove me a couple times so there was some chirping going on. You know, he looks great. He’s moving as well as he can. With everything he’s gone through, it’s pretty amazing to see how good he’s swinging it.”

If Woods can do a Prince of Penzance and get up, he’ll match Jack Nicklaus for the most green jackets. Which could’ve been red, you know. Or yellow. Or Georgia peach. Masters’ hierarchy only settled on green when Bobby Jones went strolling around the course in the 1930s and realised he was surrounded by a thousand brilliant shades of it.

The most famous jacket in sport is a swish, three-button, notch lapel, single-breasted, single-vented blazer with custom brass buttons and an embroidered patch with the Augusta National logo on the left breast pocket. It can probably dance and sing. The shade of green is officially called “Brilliant Rye Green Pantone 342” even if “Brilliant Rye Green Pantone 342” has become better known as Masters green.

The amazing single-colour dreamcoat is such a showstopper that we forget Augusta champions also receive $4.92 million, a gold medal and a trophy that depicts the clubhouse and glistens with 900 separate pieces of silver.

None of the players here need more money, medals or trophies. They’re here to win the Brilliant Rye Green Pantone 342.

The jacket come with rules. Champions get to keep it for a year. The morning after Phil Mickelson’s 2010 victory, he was wearing it when he went to a Krispy Kreme drive-thru. Two days after his 2018 triumph, Patrick Reed wore his to a Chick-fil-A burger joint in Texas. The following year, you’re meant to hand it back to the club. Where it’s kept in the clubhouse. You can only wear it again during the tournament and inside the club grounds. Gary Player has been a notable exception.

He won the first of his three Masters in 1961. Played in 1962 and then took his jacket back home to South Africa. Received a cranky phone call from Masters co-founder Clifford Roberts. Player says the conversation went like this.

The cranky Clifford Roberts: “Gary, have you got the jacket?’”

Player: “Yes. I do.”

The cranky Clifford Roberts: “Well, no one ever takes the jacket away from here.”

Player: “Well, Mr. Roberts, if you want it, why don’t you come and fetch it!’”

Woods won’t win another Brilliant Rye Green Pantone 342. He might not even finish the Masters. Swing-wise, no-one looks better on the billiard-table driving range, where his short irons fly like shooting stars and his drives are meteorites. Fitness-wise, sadly, no-one looks worse out on the course. The limp is pronounced, the discomfort is painfully clear when he birdies the 11th hole. Which is called White Dogwood. When he birdies the 12th hole. Which is called Golden Bell. When he nearly eagles the 13th hole. Which is called Azalea. He slays Amen Corner but won’t have a prayer over 72 holes. Limping away from Azalea, he uses his putter as a walking stick.