US TOUR:Tiger Woods starts his season in Abu Dhabi next week unhappy that his former coach Hank Haney is writing a book about their time together.
“I think it’s unprofessional and very disappointing,” Woods said, “especially because it’s someone I worked with and trusted as a friend. There have been other one-sided books about me and I think people understand that this book is about money. I’m not going to waste my time reading it. I just think this book is very self-serving.”
Haney left Woods in May 2010 after a six-year period in which the former world number one won six of his 14 majors.
He has not won one since and was out of the game for spells following first a sex scandal and then injury, but last month ended more than two years without tournament success when he captured the limited-field Chevron World Challenge in California.
Abu Dhabi will be his first event since then and, currently 25th on the rankings, he will be against the world’s top four, Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Rory McIlroy and Martin Kaymer.
Haney’s book, called The Big Miss, is due to be published just before the US Masters in April. On deciding not to work with him any more he said: “Tiger Woods and I will always be friends.”
Earlier this month he said: “I was a witness to greatness, and I get asked the question all the time about Tiger. I wanted to talk about it and I wanted to share it with people. That’s the bottom line. I’m not sure I understand the unprofessionalism part. He hasn’t read the book. There’s a lot of positives in there. I think he’s the greatest golfer who ever lived.
“I was just in a position to observe greatness and anyone who observes greatness likes to share it. I feel like I wrote a book that was fair and honest. It’s golf history.”
US TOUR:Colombia's Camilo Villegas and American David Toms share the lead on nine under par after the first round of the Humana Challenge at La Quinta Country Club. Villegas, starting on the back nine on the Nicklaus course, carded a flawless round featuring nine birdies, including five in his first seven holes. And Toms, who was playing the La Quinta course, also completed an error-free round with nine birdies and no bogeys to join Villegas at the top of the leaderboard. Phil Mickelson is 11 shots off the lead after a 74 which included a double bogey and triple bogey in the space of five holes.
AMATEUR:West Waterford's Gary Hurley narrowly failed in a brave bid to reach the third round of the Australian Open Amateur Championship in Melbourne yesterday.
After seemingly heading for a big defeat at four down with five to play to Germany’s Marcel Schneider the Irish international staged a stunning recovery winning three of the next four holes to take the match to the last.
And then the tie looked to be heading for sudden-death until Schneider holed out from off the back of the green on the closing hole to bag a half and seal his place in the last 16.
Defeat will give Hurley a chance to prepare for next week’s Lake Macquarie Amateur Championship along with compatriots Reeve Whitson, Dermot McElroy and Niall Gorey.
