Head For The Hills!

By late afternoon a light rain was steadily falling--much like Tiger Woods's pursuers were throughout the final round of the Bridgestone Invitational--and the outcome of the last official World Golf Championship of the season, at Firestone Country Club in Akron, was hardly in doubt. Woods was navigating the closing holes with a lead (eight strokes) that was safer than a numbered bank account in Zurich when an impatient observer near the clubhouse blurted out, "C'mon, even Little League has a 10-run rule. It's eight shots! It's Tiger!" � Another Woods victory at Firestone is as novel as another reality show. Sunday's was his third in a row and sixth in 10 starts there. His history at the club has the ring of a wedding vow: He's won in sickness and in health, in darkness and in daylight, in sunshine and in rain, in playoffs and in landslides. Last week Woods was the only player in the 83-man field to handle Firestone's lightning-fast greens and angry rough well enough to break par. His eight-under 272 came with only two bogeys over the final 48 holes and none on Sunday, when he lapped the field with a brilliant 65--all on a course that most of the pros agreed was the third most difficult of the year, behind only Augusta National and Oakmont.

The victory was different in one respect, due in part to a change in this year's Tour schedule. For the first time, Woods triumphed at Firestone without already having won a major championship. In 1999 he had taken the PGA the week before Firestone. In 2000 he had won the U.S. and British Opens as well as the PGA. In '01 it was the Masters, in '05 the Masters and British, and last season the PGA again.

Tiger is 0�for�'07 so far in the majors, but last week, for the first time since early in the year when his winning streak reached seven straight, Woods looked and played like the golfer who has 12 Grand Slam titles at age 31. Gone was the guy who couldn't hold leads at the Masters and the U.S.�Open, the guy who looked distracted while hosting his own tournament at Congressional, the guy who couldn't pull his game together at Carnoustie, replaced by the player we've become accustomed to seeing in the final round, the man with the never-on-Sunday attitude toward bogeys.

The year's first three majors have been won by first-time champions. The feeling here is that, based on Woods's showing at Firestone, that streak will end this week in Tulsa. Tiger has found his A�game, and that has obvious implications for the PGA Championship. "I'd say, 'Good luck everybody else,' " says CBS course reporter David Feherty, who followed Tiger on Sunday. He saw Woods hit 14 greens in regulation and chip in on two of the greens he missed.

The final itself turned deadly dull after Woods birdied four of the first six holes to open a four-shot lead and turn a potential grudge match with Rory Sabbatini into a rout. "It was one of the alltime great rounds I've ever seen by anyone," Feherty says. "Especially the way that course played, with hard and fast fairways and horrific rough. Tiger had that Zen-effing-transcendental look from start to finish, you know? If anybody came at him, he was going to stomp on them. Seriously, watching Tiger is like watching a different species."

Everything you needed to know about Woods's mind-set was evident on the 9th�hole, a downhill 494-yard par-4 whose firm, pitched fairway sent most tee shots into the gnarly rough. Woods parred it in all four rounds but had an adventure on Sunday. He made one of his few bad swings of the day when he dropped his head on the tee shot and pulled his ball almost onto the adjacent 10th fairway. The play would've been a chip-out and a wedge for anyone else, but Woods muscled a nine-iron past a large maple and curved his ball back toward the green. The would-be miracle shot landed in the lap of a lady sitting in a folding chair left of the green. After taking a drop, Woods made a second mistake, pitching across the green into the back fringe. Finally, after eight holes, a chink in Tiger's armor? No. Caddie Steve Williams pulled the flagstick, and Woods deftly hit a nine-iron chip that was never going anywhere but into the hole (Big Play, page�G18). Later Woods nonchalantly summarized how he had played the hole by saying, "Four shots."

The chip-in was a killer for a smoldering Sabbatini, who began the round with a one-stroke lead and had talked smack about wanting a rematch with Woods to get revenge for a final-round dusting by Tiger at the Wachovia Championship in May. After making a double bogey on the 9th to fall six shots behind, Sabbatini, who would tie for second with Justin Rose, was confronted by a fan who asked him if he still thought that Tiger was beatable, another reference to the Wachovia. Apparently the question came under the Jeopardy! category Bad Timing, because Sabbatini profanely pointed out the fan to security and had him removed from the course.

Sabbatini's brashness makes him a good quote, but there wasn't much to say about Sunday's final score: Woods�65, Sabbo�74. If they had been playing a match, Woods would've won 7 and 6. Of course, it's doubtful that Woods views Sabbatini (or anyone else) as a real threat. Like Ben Hogan, Woods has only one real opponent--the course. "Once he's out there, he turns his head off," Feherty says. "Nothing gets in, and nothing gets out until he's done."

Which is why Woods seemed to be grinding so hard on his last putt, a 13-footer for par, on the 72nd hole. He hadn't made a bogey all day, and his goal had been to keep his card clean. Never mind that he had an eight-shot lead and that the putt didn't really matter. Woods can't understand people who don't get something so simple. Like Jack Nicklaus, Woods doesn't miss many putts on the 18th hole, and he didn't miss this one.

"It's such a pleasure to watch and be here at this time in golf," Feherty says. He meant the Tiger Era, which continues at Southern Hills, where it will be an upset if Woods doesn't win a 13th major. The one constant in Tiger's career is that when he plays well, he wins, and when he plays very well, as he did on the weekend at Firestone, he dominates. He's playing well.