Tiger Woods admits to ‘constant’ pain during opening Masters round

Making his 25th appearance at Augusta National, Woods carded five bogeys and three birdies to finish two over par, nine shots adrift of playing partner Viktor Hovland and world number three Jon Rahm.

The 47-year-old continues to be troubled by the severe leg injuries he suffered in a car accident in Los Angeles in February 2021 and looked understandably rusty in just his fifth competitive round of the year.

Woods told reporters his leg felt “sore” after the round and when asked if it was worse on some shots than others, replied: “It’s constant.”

With the weather forecast to deteriorate from Friday afternoon onwards, Woods faces an uphill task to avoid missing the cut in the Masters for the first time as a professional.

“Most of the guys are going low today. This was the day to do it,” he said.

“Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be a little bit better, a little bit sharper, and kind of inch my way through it.

“This is going to be an interesting finish to the tournament with the weather coming in. If I can just kind of hang in there, maybe kind of inch my way back, hopefully it will be positive towards the end.”

There had been encouraging signs for Woods when the 15-time major winner split the fairway on the first hole and made a regulation par, but he was unable to birdie the par-five second after finding a bunker off the tee.

Woods then came up short of the third green with his approach and dropped his first shot of the day, while another shot went on the difficult fifth as he three-putted from long range.

The 47-year-old also three-putted the seventh but almost holed his pitch shot to the par-five eighth to set up a welcome birdie.

After dropping a shot on the 11th, Woods also birdied the 15th and 16th before finishing his day with another bogey on the 18th after finding sand off the tee and with his second shot.