Tiger Woods has withdrawn from the Farmers Insurance Open after suffering an injury.
It makes for the third time, in his past nine tournaments, that Woods has pulled himself from play.
The former World Number One did manage to make it to the green on his 12th hole Thursday at Torrey Pines North course. But, that’s as far as he got in the first round.
Just last weekend, Woods was seemingly ready to be a part of the Farmers tournament, saying that he had no back issues, and that he was going to be back competing. However, early in the round there were signs of distress on his face, seemingly, resulting from pain in his lower back.
A lengthy delay in the round pushed back his start time by more than two hours, and Woods later placed this to blame.
After 11 holes, Woods tolerance was a full load and he was seen exiting on a golf cart.
“It just never loosened back up again,” Woods said during a 90-second session with the media before getting into his courtesy cart. “And when we went back out, it just got progressively tighter.”
Woods, disappointed, bogeyed two of his first three holes. He made a birdie at the 16th (his seventh), and made another at holes one, and ten. This managed to put him back to even par for the round.
Unfortunately, it would not last, as he followed-up with several poor shots at the par-4 second, along with two poorly hit pitch shots. It was a badly placed chip shot that earned him a double bogey. It was here, after finally getting onto the green at the par-3 third, his 12th, Woods decided to withdraw,. He gracefully shook hands with his fellow competitors Billy Horschel and Rickie Fowler.
“It’s frustrating that it started shutting down like that,” Woods said. “I was ready to go. I had a good warm-up session the first time around. Then we stood out here and I got cold, and everything started deactivating again. And it’s frustrating that I just can’t stay activated. That’s just kind of the way it is.”
This incident makes for the sixth time overall that Woods has withdrawn from a tournament due to injury, out of all of of his 304 PGA Tour starts, but all of the withdrawals have occurred since 2010. In 2014, Woods withdrew during the final round of the Honda Classic because of back problems, and then, just a few weeks later he had surgery to repair a disk in his lower back. From 1992-2010, Woods rarely withdrew from PGA Tour events. Perhaps age is a strong factor, and is catching up with him. It’s been a long road and we all know how age can impact the healing process.
