Tiger Woods isn’t playing the Hero World Challenge this week, but he’s still making his presence felt.
Woods, whose pre-tournament press conference included some hints about a change of direction for the PGA Tour, has been on the grounds in Albany all week hosting the tournament. On Saturday he roamed the preliminary round of the range and visited contenders, including Swede Alex Noren, with whom he had a chat and asked about his swing.
We’ve already seen and heard plenty of evidence this week that Woods is investing in the modern game; read how Woods described what he admires about world champion Scottie Scheffler’s play:
“Of Scottie’s game? Yeah, I really love watching him hit the irons, the shaped shots he hits, the trajectory, the window changes he has, the distance control, the miss in the right spot, the right spin on certain pin locations,” Woods said. “These are all subtle things that mean a lot over the course of 72 holes. That’s impressive to me. If you don’t have trajectory control, you can’t have distance control. To see him move up and down in different windows, use wind, fight wind and control spin is fun to watch.”
(That was only part of his answer.)
Noren is a fascinating man to watch practice, given his unique pre-shot routines and his propensity for hitting it out of the dirt. He’s also at a fascinating place in his career, the kind of guy who was assistant captain for Europe’s Ryder Cup team this year but also almost played his way into it.
Whatever Woods said to Norwegians had a positive effect: he started par-birdie-eagle and played his way into the penultimate final round after a five-under 67. He starts Sunday’s final round in T3, three shots off Sepp Straka’s lead and two behind world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler.
Norwegians won DP World Tour events in August and September and played their way into the top 20 in the world; another top finish would cap off a strong final third of his year.
“Last year I took a lot of time off and worked a lot on my game, but this year I tried to play more tournaments at the end of the season,” Noren said. “You’ll see where you are next year. Then I have about a month and a half to solve and refine the things I don’t like now.”
As for his visit with Woods? Noren could only grin.
“Yes, it’s amazing. I grew up idolizing Tiger,” he said. “That was a perfect time in my life. I was 18 in 2000, 16 in ’98 when he came along. So yeah, I mean, I have so much respect and admiration for him.”
“And seeing him out there and asking questions and – not him asking questions himself [benefit]but I think he just likes golf and it was good to talk to him.
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