Woods criticises slow play after win

Tiger bags PGA Tour title No.75 but is left frustrated by pedestrian pace

Come in, No.75: Tiger celebrates winning the Farmers Insurance Open after a slow final day at Torrey Pines

Tiger Woods closed out his 75th PGA Tour victory with a four-shot win in the weather-delayed Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines – then savaged the glacial pace of play that tainted the event’s conclusion.

Leading by six shots on Sunday night with 11 holes to play due to fog wiping out Saturday’s third round, Woods stumbled over the finishing line with an erratic display on Monday, something which he attributed immediately afterwards to the slow play of the trio playing in the group ahead of him.

Erik Compton, Brad Fritsch and Steve Marino limped their way around the back nine of the course causing Woods and his playing partners – Casey Wittenberg and Bilyl Horschel – to have to wait for, occasionally, lengthy periods of time over almost every shot.

By the time Woods had holed out for victory, it had taken almost four hours to play 11 holes.

“I started losing my patience out there,” said Tiger. “It was just so friggin’ slow. We played just over three hours and nine holes, and three of them are par-3s. It’s like, come on, you know? I started losing my patience a little bit, and that’s when I made a few mistakes.”

He added: “The group ahead of us was a hole behind most of the entire back nine. I don’t know if they were warned or not or they were timed. But we were just playing slow. We were just having to wait on every shot, so it got a little slow.”

Slow play has become an increasingly thorny issue on the PGA Tour over the past few years but, incredibly, you have to go all the way back to 1995 for the last time a player was given a penalty stroke for taking too long to play. Glen Day was the man penalised during the Honda Classic.

The pace of play aside, Woods was satisfied to win his first PGA Tour event of the season, particularly after his ignominious halfway exit from the Abu Dhabi Championship a week earlier.

Buoyed by his eighth win at Torrey Pines as a professional, Woods is now hoping to use it is a springboard to even greater things in 2013 – although he is being coy on his prospects of reclaiming the world No.1 spot.

“That happens through a product of winning golf tournaments,” said Woods. “That’s how I got there in the first place. That’s how he got there. It’s winning golf tournaments, being consistent. Your bad weeks are going to be top tens, and when you win, you win. And you’ve got to be consistently winning. That’s how I got there.”

Woods – who revealed he would also like to get back to winning eight or nine times a season – also had a word for his critics who claim he will never be able to dominate golf they way he used to before injuries and a scandal in his private life took their toll.

“That’s their opinion,” said Woods. “That’s what they’re going to say. Whatever they say, they say. All I can do is control what I do on the golf course. And I won this tournament by four shots, so that’s something I’m proud of.”

Michael McEwan is the Deputy Editor of bunkered and has been part of the team since 2004. In that time, he has interviewed almost every major figure within the sport, from Jack Nicklaus, to Rory McIlroy, to Donald Trump. The host of the multi award-winning bunkered Podcast and a member of Balfron Golfing Society, Michael is the author of three books and is the 2023 PPA Scotland 'Writer of the Year' and 'Columnist of the Year'. Dislikes white belts, yellow balls and iron headcovers. Likes being drawn out of the media ballot to play Augusta National.

Deputy Editor