Tiger Woods Wins the 2019 Masters in a Triumph for the Ages
Tiger Woods’s comeback from personal and professional adversity is complete: He captured his fifth Masters title and his 15th major tournament on Sunday, snapping a championship drought of nearly 11 years.
It was a monumental triumph for Woods, a magical, come-from-behind win for a player who had not won a major championship since his personal life began to unravel on Thanksgiving night in 2009, when a marital dispute led to a car accident and a succession of lurid tabloid headlines. On the golf course, he had a series of back and leg injuries that led to an addiction to painkillers and culminated in pain so searing that, before surgery in 2017, he had questioned whether he could play professionally again.
Woods, who at 43 became the second-oldest winner of the Masters at Augusta National, after the then 46-year-old Jack Nicklaus in 1986, last achieved major success in one of golf’s four major tournaments at the 2008 United States Open.
“It’s overwhelming just because of what has transpired,” Woods said in a television interview after it was over. “To now be the champion — 22 years between wins is a long time — it’s unreal for me to experience this. It was one of the hardest I’ve ever had to win just because of what’s transpired the last couple of years.”
He had come close on some Sundays to winning his 15th major over the years but could not get it done. Yet after the surgery in 2017, a spinal-fusion procedure he called a “last resort,” he began a new lease on his career.
In 2017, having undergone multiple surgeries on his back, he hit rock bottom. He was charged with driving under the influence when he was found in a painkiller haze at the wheel of his car with the motor running. He later pleaded guilty to reckless driving.
As he walked to sign his scorecard for his triumphant final round, a dozen former and current stars of the game waited to embrace him and shake his hand, something that never happened in years past, when Woods was largely a loner at the top of the sport.
As he donned the green jacket for a fifth time, he said something everyone knew. “It fits.”