Tiger Woods shot an even-par 71 in the opening round of the 2018 Wells Fargo, and Sean Martin of PGATOUR.com writes that poor putting was the reason for Woods’ mediocre performance on Friday.
According to the stats provided in Martin’s piece, Woods required 31 putts and lost 1.27 strokes on the greens, finishing 120th in the 156-man field in strokes gained: putting.
Woods headed directly to the practice green after finishing his post-round interview around 6:30 p.m. He started stroking 5-foot putts between two tees that guided his putter down the proper path.
Credit: Getty Images/Streeter Lecka
Woods said he had trouble judging the speed of greens whose firmness belied their slow speed. He missed four putts inside 8 feet, including 4-footers on Nos. 14 and 16. He three-putted the 16th hole from just 15 feet after running his birdie putt by the hole.
He had to hole a 17-footer for par on the par-3 17th hole after leaving his first putt well short and missed a 10-foot birdie putt on the 18th green after a strong approach from a fairway bunker.
“(The greens) feel springy and they feel fast, especially as I’m walking on them, but they’re not putting that way,” Woods said. “What I was feeling and sensing just didn’t match up.”
Woods lost 1.27 strokes on the greens Thursday, ranking 120th in the 156-man field in strokes gained: putting. He started the week ranked eighth (+0.74) in that statistic.
