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By DOUG FERGUSON
AP Golf Writer
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland (AP) — Five
hundred years of legend and lore hardly prepared golf's hallowed
home for Tiger Woods.
On the same linksland that Old Tom Morris
nurtured and Jack Nicklaus conquered, along came a 24-year-old
with a keen eye for history.
Woods not only became the youngest player
to win the career Grand Slam, he completed it faster than any
of the four greats who did it before him.
The final piece came Sunday, when Woods
held the silver claret jug under the cool, gray skies of St.
Andrews after another record-breaking performance to win the
British Open.
“It's the ultimate,” Woods said.
“This is the home of golf. This is where you always want
to win. To have a chance to complete the slam at St. Andrews
is pretty special. I was able to bring it home.”
He brought it home in style, strolling
over the stone Swilken Bridge on the 18th fairway and right into
history.
Challenged briefly by David Duval, Woods
pulled away for an eight-stroke victory. It wasn't quite as overwhelming
as his 15-stroke victory in the U.S. Open last month, but it
was the largest in 87 years of golf's oldest championship.
Woods doesn't only win, he wins by record
margins.
Perhaps Tom Watson, the only man to win
a British Open at five courses but never at St. Andrews, summed
it up best.
“He is something supernatural,”
Watson said. “He has raised the bar to a level that only
he can jump.”
Hundreds of daring fans tried to leap over
the burn on the 18th fairway to watch Woods finish off his latest
masterpiece. He didn't disappoint them, making a par on the final
hole for a 69 that set another benchmark for years to come.
He finished at 19-under 269, the lowest
score in relation to par ever at a major championship and the
best score ever at St. Andrews.
Asked if he as good as he can get, Woods
said: “No, no, no no. Definitely not.”
He became the first player to win all four
majors since Jack Nicklaus' victory in the 1966 British Open
at age 26.
Having won three of the last four majors,
Woods seems to be racing toward the record that matters the most
— the 18 majors Nicklaus won in a career that remains the
standard.
For now.
“He is the chosen one. He's the best
player who has played the game right now,” said Mark Calcavecchia,
who stuck around St. Andrews to watch history in the making.
“If Jack was in his prime today, I don't think he could
keep up with Tiger.”
Comparing eras is never easy, but Woods'
performance in the majors stands alone.
Woods won the British Open by eight strokes
over Ernie Els and Thomas Bjorn, the largest margin of victory
in the British Open since 1913, when J.H. Taylor won by eight
strokes over Ted Ray.
Woods became only the third British Open
champion to win with four rounds in the 60s, and he beat by one
stroke the record Nick Faldo set at St. Andrews in 1990.
“The guy is simply in a different
league,” Faldo said.
Woods also became the first player since
Watson in 1982 to win the U.S. and British Opens in the same
year, and the first since Nicklaus in 1972 to own three major
championships at the same time.
Woods now goes to the PGA Championship
with a chance to join Ben Hogan as the only players to win three
majors in one year.
And what about after that?
“He's always had his own goals,”
father Earl Woods said. “I'd say the next one is winning
all four of them in one year — soon.”
Els also set a record — the first
player to finish second in three straight majors. He now has
been runner-up to Woods six times, more than any other player.
Els shot a 69, while Bjorn closed with
a 71 to finish at 277.
But the real challenge came from Duval,
No. 2 in the world ranking behind Woods. It was the first time
they were paired together in the final group of a final round
— in a major championship, no less.
Duval went out in 32 and was only three
strokes back until Woods, perhaps sensing history slipping away,
poured it on with birdies on three of the next four holes.
Meanwhile, Duval crumbled. He was playing
for second until hitting into the notorious Road Hole bunker
on No. 17 and taking four shots to get out. He finished with
a 75.
“As good as everything turned on the
front nine was as bad as everything turned on the back,”
Duval said.
“He simply didn't make mistakes, and
he capitalized on the holes you expect to capitalize on. It was
a spectacular performance, to say the least.”
The other players to win the Grand Slam
were Gene Sarazen in 1935, Hogan in 1953, Gary Player in 1965
and Nicklaus in '66 at Muirfield. Nicklaus went on to win the
Grand Slam two more times.
“They've been the elite players to
ever play the game,” Woods said. “And to be in the
same breath as those guys, it makes it very special.”
Not only is Woods the youngest player to
win all four majors, he did it in only his 93rd sanctioned tournament,
compared with 125 for Nicklaus.
Woods won $759,150 from the record purse
at the British Open. It was his sixth victory this year, 21st
on the PGA Tour and 25 worldwide.
With the claret jug on a wooden table next
to the first tee, shining in the bright sunlight over Scotland,
Woods set out for what figured to be another breeze along the
coast of the North Sea.
Unlike the U.S. Open, a challenge awaited.
Duval made the Old Course look like PGA
West in the California desert, where he shot the only final-round
59 in history. After a nice lag putt from 70 feet on the first,
Duval hit it stiff to 2 and 5 feet on the next two holes for
birdies.
Woods, in his trademark Chianti-colored
sweater and black slacks, looked uncomfortable from the start,
shifting his legs over his first two birdie putts and missing
both from inside 10 feet. When he finally made one on No. 4 from
18 feet, he showed more emotion than he had all week by raising
the putter with his left hand and punching the air with his right.
If there was a turning point, it came on
the 10th hole.
Duval got a huge break when his drive hit
on the top of a pot bunker and carried along the baked turf to
about pin high, where a simple chip left him 12 feet for birdie.
The putt was on line for the cup but stopped inches short.
He grimaced, scolded himself under his
breath and sulked off the green, standing to the side as Woods
buried a 10-foot birdie to build the lead back to four strokes.
Despite a sore back, Duval showed plenty
of fight.
He also knew when it was time to concede.
A sloppy bogey by Duval and a routine birdie by Woods on the
12th hole restored the lead to six strokes, and Woods cruised
to victory.
That could make for a long flight home.
Duval and Woods were scheduled to be on the same charter plane
to Florida — along with the claret jug.
Such was the case two years ago when Woods
finished one stroke out of a playoff at Royal Birkdale, won by
his good friend Mark O'Meara.
“I brought the claret jug back on
the plane with Tiger,” O'Meara said. “He held it and
knew that he wanted it someday.”
He has it now, holding on with such a firm
grip that anyone is going to have a hard time wresting it away.
Or any other major, for that matter.
“I played the regular tour events.
Tiger plays his own events,” Els said. “I'm probably
living in an era where we're going to see the next great player.”
Then he paused, realizing what had unfolded
over the past four days.
“We're already seeing that.”
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Tiger joins a select group
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland (AP) — Tiger
Woods' record compared to the four other golfers who have completed
the career grand slam:
THE OTHERS:
Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Ben Hogan and Gene Sarazen.
THE MOST:
Nicklaus is the only one to do it more than once, achieving it
three times at age 26, 31 and 38. He would have completed a fourth
cycle, but finished second in the British Open seven times.
THEIR AGES:
It took Sarazen 13 years after his first major to complete the
slam at age 33. Hogan needed seven years, overcame a near-fatal
car crash, and was 41. Player, the only non-American, needed
six years and was 28. Nicklaus was 26 the first time and needed
four years. Woods is 24 and did it in three.
BY THE CALENDAR:
Woods, who won the PGA Championship last August and the U.S.
Open last month, is the first player since Nicklaus in '72 to
hold three of the four major championships. Nicklaus won the
'71 PGA and added the Masters and U.S. Open the following season.
He finished a shot behind Lee Trevino at the '72 British Open,
where he was trying to become the first player to hold all four
at the same time.
THE DOUBLE:
Woods is the first to complete the U.S. Open and British Open
double since Tom Watson in '82. If he successfully defends the
PGA at Vahalla next month, he will be the first to win three
majors in one season since Ben Hogan in '53.
ALMOST THERE:
Players who have won three majors but not the fourth: Walter
Hagen, Tom Watson, Arnold Palmer, Sam Snead, Lee Trevino, Byron
Nelson and Ray Floyd.
TIGER'S TRACKS:
Woods' record in the majors:
1995 — Masters, 41st (as an amateur);
U.S. Open, withdrew (amateur); British Open, 68th (amateur);
PGA (amateur, did not play).
1996 — Masters, missed cut (amateur);
U.S. Open, 82nd (amateur); British Open, 22nd (amateur); PGA
(did not play).
1997 — Masters, 1st; U.S. Open, 19th;
British Open, 24th; PGA, 29th.
1998 — Masters, 8th; U.S. Open, 18th;
British Open, 3rd; PGA, 10th.
1999 — Masters, 18th; U.S. Open, 3rd;
British Open, 7th; PGA, 1st.
2000 — Masters, 5th; U.S. Open, 1st,
British Open, 1st; PGA (begins Aug. 17).
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