Tiger Woods, Injured Grinder, Makes Cut at the Memorial

“It was a bit of struggle,” he said, adding: “I’m a lot older now, so things change, they evolve. You try to suck it up as best you can and get through it.”

Woods’s playing partner, Rory McIlroy, saw what was happening.

“Yeah, you could sort of tell when we made the turn, he hit a couple fairway wood shots off the tee that he sort of quit on,” said McIlroy, the No. 1 ranked golfer on the tour. “He wasn’t quite moving as well.”

During those holes, there was a post-swing scene that recurred for Woods: With a pained expression, he would watch a wayward tee shot land in deep rough, then sigh and softly mumble something to himself under his breath.

McIlroy was asked if Woods said anything about his back troubling him.

“No, not really, I mean, you can tell — he might make a bit of a grimace after a shot,” McIlroy said. He continued: “He’s never been one to make excuses, right? So, no, he’s never going to do that.”

In the end, Woods gave himself a chance to make the cut by finding the resolve to shoot two-under par on his final three holes. On the par-5 seventh hole — his 16th hole of the day because he began his round on the 10th tee — Woods’s spectacular recovery from a greenside bunker left a two-foot birdie putt. He then sank a 20-foot birdie putt on the 209-yard, par-3 eighth hole after an impressive tee shot to an elevated green.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/17/sports/golf/tiger-woods-memorial-tournament-score.html