Well, it wasn’t the last time. And this time it wasn’t fun either. When his ball never landed on TPC Harding Park, Thomas was forced to take the run and distance penalty. His next tee shot was the third on the hole. He was unlucky and with the stiff penalty he made another double bogey. He did well only to save a 71 with a bird in the difficult ninth hole.
McIlroy fired at 70 and Woods was a low man in the group with a 68.
As for Woods, the accident was somewhat predictable.
At the Olympic Club, which is visible across Lake Merced from TPC Harding Park, there have been many high-profile accidents involving balls hanging in the thick cypress trees common to the city’s golf courses.
Lee Janzen saw his ball get stuck in a tree during the last round of the 1998 US Open at the Olympic Club, but it fell short of the five-minute search limit and went on to win the tournament. Lee Westwood started the final round of the 2012 US Open at the Olympics in fourth place, but lost a shot on a cypress tree and went on to finish four times behind Webb Simpson.
Even Woods, who attended Stanford University in Palo Alto, just down the peninsula of TPC Harding Park, admitted that he had lost his golf balls against the cypress trees.
“Well, not here,” he said. “I had a few on (nearby) Lake Merced. It is one of the narrowest and most claustrophobic golf courses I have ever played. Yes, I lost some of them there. “
