Tiger Woods, endurance and the long road back to the first tee at the Masters

AUGUSTA, Ga. — Tiger Woods arrived to work with a leg full of rods and plates and screws, carrying his pain around like a physical thing, talking a lot about endurance. That pain is his constant companion now. He said he plans on playing this year's Masters, with a belief he can win, and that when his golf career ends, it will because he says so. The hurting leg and back is the price he pays for that agency and control.

He just smiled when asked what each round took from him, as if that knowledge was something that couldn't be shared with words. He's famously guarded — his two yachts are named Privacy and Solitude — and is happiest when he's unseen. His daughter, Sam, joked recently in his World Golf Hall of Fame induction speech that he's been to Comic-Con events dressed as Batman. But now he can't hide anymore. Everyone knows what it's taken for him to simply be here.

«It's up to me to endure the pain,» he said.

The final act of his career has begun, one that is revealing finally after all these years the truest version of himself. The crowds here at Augusta National the past two days know this. Walking the course, he's been greeted by galleries showering him with something subtly new. Adoration, he's known. Awe and excitement and fear, too. But this was love, and respect, and he felt both.

«It's hard to believe it's been 25 years since I [first] won here,» he said.

Phenom Tiger felt like a creation of his father, Earl. The Tiger Slam victory robot felt like a creation of publicists and marketing gurus. His public downfall, the affairs and the arrest, felt authentic but a reflection of his worst impulses. The golfer who emerged from years of back surgeries to win the 2019 Masters felt like a reflection of his best. His