Viewer records are not that easy to measure on golf courses, not even at the famous Masters. Unlike stadiums, people are spread out over a large, open field – and the exact number of tickets sold is a closely guarded secret at Augusta Nation Golf Club.
One can therefore only roughly estimate how many people gathered at the first tee of the Augusta National Golf Club at 11:04 a.m. on Thursday. It could have been ten thousand, maybe fifteen thousand, the rest of the complex seemed comparatively empty in those minutes. It will probably have been a record. Those lucky enough to be there made a pilgrimage in one direction: to Tiger Woods. Whoever could, had to watch this one shot. And those who somehow managed to get into the front rows are now immortalized in one of the iconic images of Wood’s career.
The return of the 46-year-old Woods to Augusta is also a unique moment for him, also – or precisely because – his career is already full of unique moments: the warm embrace with his father Earl after his first Masters victory in 1997; the countless dreamlike golf shots that brought him 108 tournament wins worldwide; but also Woods, who cheated on his family and his wife and who couldn’t even walk a straight line at a police stop because he was so high. Then the renewed victory at the Masters 2019, this time his children were in his arms. And last year, on February 23, 2021, finally this picture of a car wreck in Los Angeles, where Tiger Woods almost lost his life in an accident.
On February 23, 2021, Tiger Woods crashed his SUV in Rancho Palos Verdes near Los Angeles. He survived the car accident with serious injuries.
(Photo: Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP)
For a long time it was unclear whether the most successful golfer in history would ever play a tournament again. The fact that he is now competing in the Masters sometimes seems as if a round from the old days is being broadcast. Looking at the faces of the spectators who followed him around the famous square in the US state of Georgia on Thursday, one could see disbelief. No one looked at where Woods’ ball went. How he played was irrelevant.
People shook their heads in amazement when he just walked past them. They cheered enthusiastically on every good shot and every bad one, cheering on virtually every step Woods took, hoping that the repaired knee would hold up. And what did he do, the unapproachable one, who for the past 25 years has mostly coolly ignored his fans because all he cared about was the next win? He smiled back.
Salute to the audience: Tiger Woods.
(Photo: Mike Blake/Reuters)
He enjoyed being back the athlete that eventually became bigger than the sport. Everything that seems normal in golf today – the high prize money, the international attention, the athleticism of the players – all of this goes back to him. That’s also why no player is jealous of Woods if he gets all the attention as soon as he takes part in a tournament. The generation that is leading the world today grew up with and was inspired by Woods.
Tiger Woods has always been a perfectionist and fallible at the same time – that’s what makes him so fascinating for the masses
Some athletes’ careers are defined by sporting brilliance, or by a mixture of talent and work. Roger Federer or Michael Schumacher, for example, have come as close to sporting perfection as hardly anyone else. Others define themselves by ups and downs, by human drama and the will to still keep going. Tiger Woods combines both, he is a perfectionist and yet fallible. He was the child prodigy, he worked more than everyone else, but the pictures of his career tell not only sporting stories, but above all human stories.
For years, the spectators at the first tee in Augusta had to put up with him ignoring them, even though they were already celebrating him back then. Then they had to forgive him for his missteps and watch him fight his way back from injuries and eventually even out of a completely wrecked SUV that had fallen down an embankment. Because they experienced his career in all these dimensions, they can cheer him on in disbelief as they do today.