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On Tuesday afternoon, Tiger Woods posted on his social media accounts that he ruptured the Achilles tendon in his left leg while training, and earlier that morning underwent “minimally invasive” surgery to repair the tendon.
“As I began to ramp up my own training and practice at home, I felt a sharp pain in my left Achilles, which was deemed to be ruptured,” Woods wrote. “This morning, Dr. Charlton Stucken of Hospital for Special Surgery in West Palm Beach, Florida performed a minimally-invasive Achilles tendon repair for a ruptured tendon. “The surgery went smoothly, and we expect a full recovery,” added Dr. Stucken. I am back home now and plan to focus on my recovery and rehab, thank you for all the support.”
It’s not immediately clear how he ruptured the tendon beyond “training and practice,” or how long this will keep him out. This is the latest of many injuries for Tiger Woods, who had not planned to play at this week’s Players Championship. He pulled out of the Genesis Invitational in the wake of his mother’s death, saying he was not in the right place mentally to compete.
The question now, however, is whether there is any chance that Woods will be able to play in next month’s Masters. It was presumed that Tiger was doing everything he could to prepare for that event, but typical recovery times for this surgery make it highly unlikely that he’ll be anywhere near ready to play the year’s first major.
The last time Tiger played competitively on the PGA Tour was at Royal Troon for last year’s Open Championship. Since then, he has competed at the PNC Championship with his son Charlie—where he walked—and for his Jupiter Links team in several TGL matches.
Despite speculation that he might play in this week’s Players Championship, he gave a pretty definitive indication last Tuesday that he wouldn’t register by the Friday deadline.
“This is the third time I’ve touched a club since my mum passed,” Woods said following his last TGL match, “so I haven’t really gotten into it. My heart’s not really into practicing right now…once I start probably feeling a bit better and getting into it, I’ll start looking at the schedule.”
Most sources indicate that recovery from even minor Achilles tendion repair surgery is a matter of months, not weeks, which—if his recovery follows a typical timeline—would reasonably be expected to keep him out of the remaining summer majors.
Dr. Alex Shafiro, an orthopedic specialist who treats sports medicine injuries at New York’s Hospital for Special Surgery, said that Woods’ recovery will entail “immediate muscle activation with blood flow restriction device.” He said that Woods will likely be booted for three to six weeks depending on how aggressive the surgeon and Tiger decide to be, and that it will be months before he can expect to play.
Main Image: Ben Jared
