Tiger Woods is out of the wilderness

WITH career-threatening injuries and a personal life in turmoil, Tiger Woods was stuck in the golfing wilderness for almost two years.

Tiger Woods

IT is five years since Tiger Woods won the most recent of his 14 major championships and seven since he played the most exquisite, controlled golf to secure the third of his three Open Championships at Royal Liverpool.

There was a point when it seemed just a matter of time before the greatest player of this generation - possibly any generation - equalled and then passed Jack Nicklaus's record haul of 18 major championships. But then he stalled.

With his personal life in turmoil, and with career-threatening injuries hanging over him, Woods headed into the golfing wilderness for the best part of two years. Many thought he would not be coming back.

Fit and healthy once more, apart from a recent left elbow strain, he has since learnt to win again. This season alone, he has four victories and has reclaimed the world No1 ranking from Rory McIlroy. But he still keeps coming up short in the majors. Could this be about to change?

"Even though I haven't won a major championship in five years, I've been there in a bunch of them," Woods said at Muirfield yesterday (Tuesday). "I've had my chances. I just need to keep putting myself there and eventually I'll get some." Note the plural.

"I feel very good about my game. I've felt very good going into the major championships and I've had a pretty good year so far; won four times. What's missing? It's just a shot here and there. It's making a key up-and-down here or getting a good bounce there, capitalising on an opportunity."

Woods's strategy at Hoylake in 2006 was to keep his driver, his most wayward club, in his bag, using irons on the hard, fast-running fairways and avoiding the rough. It is a strategy that could work to good effect here.

Among those who have been sniping from the sidelines, questioning Woods's commitment to the cause, has been Hank Haney, his former coach.

"For whatever reason, Tiger doesn't prepare for majors as hard as he could," Haney said recently. "He plays the course in a rushed way, maybe once or twice before the tournament week, then in the tournament week Tiger has got into a routine of playing nine-hole practice rounds on some days."

Woods rarely rises to the such bait, but was keen to justify his approach when asked about the elbow injury that he has been carrying since before the US Open at Merion last month.

"I was always going to play just nine holes each day," he said after playing the third of them yesterday (Tuesday). "That was the plan - not to push it on this hard ground.

"I've been playing a lot at home [in Florida]. But I wanted to make sure that I'm rested and feel fit and ready to go for the championship. I've done a lot of homework on the greens each day and have got a really good feel for them.

"The elbow feels good. I needed to have this thing set and healed. And everything is good to go."

Haney also believes that Woods is putting himself under added pressure by focusing on Nicklaus's record.

"Tiger is having a real hard time winning the easiest major he is going to win - No15," he said. "No18, to tie Jack, and 19 to beat Jack, those are going to be the hard ones."

There have been 18 different winners of the past 20 majors - only Padraig Harrington and Rory McIlroy have won more than one - and Woods confessed that it is getting harder to win them.

"The fields are so deep now and the margin between the first players and the last in the field is not that big any more," he said. "That's one of the reasons you're seeing so many first-time winners."

One player with four majors in the bag, but yet to win an Open Championship is Phil Mickelson. Fresh from his victory in a play-off at the Aberdeen Asset Management Scottish Open last Sunday, he has struggled in the past to get to grips with links golf, but says now that he understands what it takes to win on such courses.

Asked to explain his relationship with links golf, he described it thus: "It's hate/love. I used to hate it, now I love it."

Whereas Woods said that he fell in love with this style of golf from the moment he first played it, Mickelson, with a high ball flight, struggled in the wind. Now, he says, he loves the challenge.

"It changed for me in 2004 when Dave Pelz and I spent some time over here and developed a shot that feels easy to get the ball on the ground and in play off the tee," he said.

And what of his chances of back-to-back victories? "It's difficult to win the week before a major and then follow it up winning the major," he said. "But then again, the last person to do it? You are looking at him."

So Woods and Mickelson fancy their chances. What a head-to-head that would be coming down the stretch on Sunday.