ALBANY, Bahamas — Tiger Woods, making yet another comeback at this week’s Hero World Challenge at Albany Golf Club, said Tuesday he’s so healthy and clear of mind, he’s “loving life now.”
Woods, 41, who has had as many back surgeries (three) as he has had official tournament starts in the last 27 months, will play this week for the first time since last February, when he withdrew from the Dubai Desert Classic.
He had surgery to fuse vertebrae in his lower back in April and said he’s now pain-free for the first time in years.
“This week is big for me to be able to play golf and be explosive and hit shots,” Woods said Tuesday in advance of the Hero. “This surgery was about quality of life, because I didn’t really have much. I haven’t been able to play golf with my friends for two years. Man, I’ve missed it.”
The low point in the last couple of years for Woods was his embarrassing arrest last Memorial Day weekend, when he was found, in the middle of the night, asleep behind the wheel of his Mercedes, which was running on the side of the road a few miles from his Jupiter Beach, Fla., home.
Toxicology tests found several painkillers in his system — drugs that Woods later said he was taking to reduce the pain in his back.
“I was trying to get away from the pain and trying to sleep, which I hadn’t done in a long time because of the things I was dealing with,” he explained. “As my back improved, I’ve been able to sleep again without pain running down my leg. I’m loving life right now. … I feel fantastic.”
When asked Tuesday if he has watched the police video that went viral of the officers conducting a sobriety test on him as he appeared catatonic, Woods replied with a terse, “No.”
Asked in an earlier interview with the Golf Channel if he thought about retirement, Woods said: “I don’t know if retirement is the right word, but I didn’t think I would ever play golf with my friends again. I was pretty much bedridden. I couldn’t go to dinner, because I couldn’t sit up in a chair. I couldn’t drive a car.
“So playing golf at an elite level again was furthest from my mind.”
Asked if he feels as if he’ll be able to compete at an elite level again, Woods said: “I would like to play at the elite level again. I miss being at that level. It’s been a few years since I’ve been there.
“I feel like I certainly have the mind to do it. I certainly have the hands to do it. It’s a matter of having the body to do it. I’m still getting used to my new body. It’s going to take time. This is new. This is a tight lower back, but I’ll trade that any day for having my life back.”