Tiger finds little 'Joy of Driving' on Day 1 of BMW Championship
Tiger Woods walked past a pair of shiny BMWs flanking a white, monument-esque "The Joy of Driving" sign situated between the 11th and 18th fairways and headed straight for his tee shot, after driving it into a bunker.
There was no joy for the defending champ of the BMW Championship on Thursday at Cog Hill, however.
While there were "Tiger moments," like when he cut an approach around a tree to set up a birdie on No. 10, and when he launched a flier lie from just short of a fairway trap on No. 13 to give himself another birdie chance, he had too many other shots when he said he "got caught" between the take-aways of his old swing and new swing.
Woods bogeyed his opening hole, after flaring a 3-wood off the first tee, and 2-over par is how he finished Day One of the third leg of the FedEx Cup playoffs. He's 9 shots behind leader Matt Kuchar.
The top 30 finishers in the playoff standings after this weekend advance to the Tour Championship, and Woods is in jeopardy of not moving on.
"Well, I just got to keep plodding along," Woods said. "As of right now, I'm only five shots out of that spot. That's not bad. Guys aren't going low at this place. The greens aren't good enough to go low. Obviously there's a couple of guys that played today, but overall the guys just aren't tearing the place apart."
Woods' driving wasn't good enough to shoot a low number. He scrambled all day, finishing the front nine in 3 over.
On the back, he missed fairways on Nos. 10, 11, 13 and 17. On the par-3 12th, after back-to-back birdies got him to plus-1, he splashed his tee shot into the bunker and then slammed his club into his golf bag, producing a loud thud.
An errant approach on No. 15 led to a tossed club out of frustration. He missed the green on the 18th, too.
He did drain 3 birdie putts on the back nine, including a 10-footer on the par-3 14th. But he had no heroics with the putter that drew an explosive roar from the crowd.
"I had a hard time hitting the putts hard enough," said Woods, who's won five times at Cog Hill. "I putt a lot on memory, obviously, and it's hard to make myself hit the putts this hard when I know how they used to putt."
As he walked off the 18th green, stoical as always, a woman yelled to Woods.
"You rock, honey," she said. "Tomorrow."
Woods knows he has to play better - starting today.
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<li><a href="/story/?id=406865">Nothing quiet about Kuchar's first round at Cog Hill<span class="date"> [9/9/10]</span></a></li>
<li><a href="/story/?id=407050">Casual day? Not for tie-wearing Moore<span class="date"> [9/9/10]</span></a></li>
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