Tiger Puts on Breaks With a 65

He can drive the ball from Thousand Oaks to Oxnard and that makes it hard enough on everybody else, but what can you do when Tiger Woods caroms his tee shot off a hill at the back of a par-three green, sees the ball bounce back and watches it roll 18 inches from the hole?

In other words, what happens when the best player in the world is lucky too?

Friday at Sherwood Country Club, what happened was a seven-under-par 65, a seven-birdie, no-bogey round that vaulted him into a one-shot lead over Padraig Harrington and Davis Love III after the second round of the Target World Challenge.

Woods laughed at his good fortune at 17.

“I tried to hit a soft nine-iron,” he said. “I hit a soft nine-iron flop hook that had delayed spin. It came off the hill with a left-to-right spin, rolled through the rough and left myself about a foot and a half for a birdie.

“Other than that, it was a great shot, wasn’t it? I got a great break.”

If he’s playing pingpong, Woods wants to win. If he’s playing cards, he wants to win. Roller hockey, pickup basketball, polo, dominoes, Monopoly, spelling bee, it doesn’t matter: Tiger plays to win.

Even golf ... especially golf, regardless of the stakes, which means that a $3.8-million special event like this one, with nothing to lose except the chance to bring home a truckload of money, is not something Woods is going to ignore.

Woods and Phil Mickelson started at four under and played together, but Woods picked up nine shots on Mickelson, who drove the ball poorly and finished with a 74.

Said Mickelson, “It’s not just my driving. It’s every shot.”

Woods was sympathetic. “He had a tough day,” Tiger said.

As for Woods, who is at 11-under 133, his day was a breeze. He was the only player in the field of 16 without a bogey.

There are five par-five holes at Sherwood and Woods birdied them all. As good as that was, Harrington was even better, playing them six under and making eagle at No. 2 for the second day in a row.

He bogeyed the 18th after driving too far left to risk going for the green, but Harrington still managed a 69 and is at 10-under 134. Love, who was in Sun Valley on a snowboarding vacation last week, still managed to hit some golf balls because there wasn’t a lot of snow. Love eagled the second, birdied two of the last three holes and signed for a 68.

Harrington played in only nine events that are sanctioned by the PGA Tour, but only two of them were regular tour events and the rest were the four majors and three of the World Golf Championship events.

Woods says the Irishman would benefit from playing more PGA Tour events, and so would the tour.

“Padraig is a great player,” Woods said. “He’s so consistent, week in and week out. He’d be a great addition.

“It wouldn’t hurt him because you’re playing against deeper fields. That’s going to enhance your experience.”

But Harrington likes his schedule the way it is and says he won’t change it to play more in the U.S.

“I’m still progressing now in Europe,” he said. “I do like playing in the U.S. I like the speed of the greens -- they’re a little quicker, but there’s not enough time in the year to play all the tournaments I want to play. I really like playing around the world and if I committed to here, it would limit everything else.”

Nick Price had a 70 and is two shots behind Woods. Bernhard Langer’s 65 moved him into a tie for fifth with Retief Goosen and David Toms.