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CHARLOTTE, May 7: Tiger Woods returned to the PGA Tour with mixed results on Thursday. The world number one carded a bogey-free, three-under-par 69, his fifth round in the 60s in his last 13 attempts , and was five shots adrift of leader Kirk Triplett, 42.
But Woods struggled off the tee in the opening round, hitting only four of 14 fairways, and he only made 10 of 18 greens in regulation. If not for a combination of good putting and a lucky bounce off the rocks in the creek on the 18th hole, Woods's score would have been much worse.
Woods was in excellent form on the greens, taking 25 putts including 11 one-putts. The 28-year-old American took three weeks off before the Wachovia event. In his first seven tournaments this year, Woods has shown only brief glimpses of the game he displayed earlier in his career.
Even though he won the WGC-World Match Play Championship in February, Woods said he got lucky after being outplayed in two of the matches.
First round scores
64 Kirk Triplett
66 Fredrik Jacobson, Stuart Appleby, Rory Sabbatini, Brett Quigley
67 Notah Begay, Mike Weir, Heath Slocum, Cameron Beckman, Jay Delsing, Luke Donald
68 Vijay Singh, Jonathan Kaye, Joe Ogilvie, Carlos Franco
69 Joey Sindelar, Matt Gogel, Shigeki Maruyama, Spike McRoy, Jerry Kelly, Chris DiMarco, John Senden, Steve Allan, Arron Oberholser, Geoff Ogilvy, Tiger Woods, Billy Andrade, Mathias Gronberg
Romero eyes history
FOREST OF ARDEN: A two shot penalty on veteran Eduardo Romero prevented him from taking the second round lead of the British Masters on Friday. The 49-year-old was standing over a six inch putt on the 14th green when the ball suddenly moved.
Romero did not believe he had grounded his putter, which would have put the ball in play, so did not consider it a stroke. But when he went into the scorer's hut after his round referee John Paramor told him he had grounded his putter and had to take a two shot penalty.
He had shot a five-under 67 on Thursday and looked to have gone one better on Friday to move to 11-under for the championship until the penalty was called, leaving him at nine-under and one behind second round leader Patrik Sjoland of Sweden.
A slim downed Lee Westwood went on a birdie blitz to put himself firmly in contention for the weekend. The Englishman, who has lost 30lbs since Christmas, shot a seven-under 65.
Only a three putt at the ninth for a bogey, his 18th hole, spoiled the card that put Westwood at eight-under for the championship and only two behind Sjoland.
Leading second round scores:
134 Patrik Sjoland (Sweden) 69 65
135 Eduardo Romero 67 68, Brian Davis 68 67
136 Lee Westwood 71 65
137 Stephen Gallacher 69 68, Nick O'Hern 69 68
138 Angel Cabrera 70 68, Michael Campbell 67 71, Santiago Luna 70 68, Jean-Francois Lucquin 70 68. -Agencies
