Tiger Woods withdraws from the PGA Championship | Sports

Can you sign one of the worst laps of your career and yet end with recognition and applause from the world of golf? Yes, if we talk about Tiger Woods. Of this Tiger Woods. The champion of 15 majors, 46 years old, suffered this Saturday like few times in a field, on the third day of the PGA Championship, second major of the season, on the twisty Southern Hills course, in Tulsa, Okla. A suffering due to his battered physical state that has ended in withdrawal from the tournament. El Tigre will not compete this Sunday, which is the first early goodbye of a great in his professional career.

The Tiger drags a very damaged bodywork. Five knee operations, five back operations, and a very serious fracture of his right leg just over a year ago in a traffic accident have ended in a lame man. Literally, Tiger Woods cannot walk without an obvious limp, a forced movement of the hip, the pain reflected in his face. Do it for five hours on a golf course, with its ups and downs, for several days in a row and with the physical effort required by the movement of the swing, leads Woods to a real ordeal. If the conditions are also against him, like this Saturday in Southern Hills (wind, cold, rain, an early start that did not allow him much warm-up…), the ordeal becomes a nightmare. Tiger rowed and rowed on Friday to make the cut in the second major in a row that he played, after a 47th place in the Masters, the first tournament he played in more than 500 days, and the titanic effort took its toll. There were nine shots over par, for a total of +12, at the tail of the pack among those who made the cut. The Chilean Mito Pereira is the leader in the last round with -9 (birdie in 18), by the -6 of the American Will Zalatoris and the English Matt Fitzpatrick (none of the three has a victory in the American circuit).

The 79 strokes that Tiger delivered are his worst return in the PGA Championship, the third highest in his imperial career in the greats (after the 81 of the British Open of 2002 and the 80 of the US Open of 2015) and the fifth worst of his entire career. And yet, the public and his teammates recognized the enormous merit of the champion for continuing to compete until the end of the round despite his obvious gestures of pain. And that’s where he got. The PGA confirmed the withdrawal of the Tiger. On the horizon appears the US Open in June and, above all, a very special British Open in July, the 150th edition of the European great, in the Scottish cradle of Saint Andrews, a flatter course that can give a break to the punished legs of the tiger.

“It’s incredibly tough. suffer in every swing, but he is the best professional. If he had been me, he would have considered retiring and going home, but Tiger is different. It’s been a monumental effort,” explained McIlroy, his roundmate for the first two days.

ice baths

Two great and two last cuts. You have to be made of steel get Tiger’s machado in the Masters and the PGA. With a physique that is surely at 50% of the capacity it could acquire with more training and rehabilitation (and more ice baths), overcoming obstacles can only be explained from a unique mental strength. “I’ve already won a big lame,” Woods told himself, recalling the 2008 US Open he won with torn ligaments. And so his mind forced him to go on, to push.

Until arriving at this Saturday in which the ordeal became almost unbearable. An bogey on the second hole, with the ball in the water, the step by the dentist advanced. Cold, pain, humidity… Triple bogey on six, two shots too many on seven and nine… six shots over par on the first nine holes. And more bogeys at 10, 11, 12, 13… five bogeys consecutive in a large. Unthinkable for a Tiger who resisted and ended up writing an ode to suffering. The birdie of the 15th he celebrated it almost like a liberation.

It wasn’t just a day for Tiger’s suffering. Jon Rahm also stopped by the Southern Hills operating room. Six bogeys (three in the first nine holes and another three in the seconds) increased their card to eight over par, moons from the head. Many steps above the Basque, the Catalan Adri Arnaus is shining in just the third major he disputes at 27 years old, after making his debut on the European circuit with his victory in the Catalunya Championship. With two birdies on holes two and five, he made his way into the top 10 in the standings, but the day got steep with two bogeys on the 15th and 17th holes to sign par on the day and also in the total.

Full PGA Ranking.

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