At the Medalist Club in Jupiter, Fla. — Tiger Woods’ home course — there are a set of tees reserved for only the best of the best. Pushed back beyond where even the lowest handicaps care to play from, they are aptly named the “Tiger Tees.” When you are golf royalty, you get some pretty honorable perks.
This weekend in Florida (Orlando this time) for the PNC Championship, another Woods will be playing from a unique set of tees.
Tiger’s son — 11-year-old Charlie — making his debut on the national stage, will be teeing it up next to his dad for the annual end-of-year hit-and-giggle showcasing pro-and-family-member duos. But instead of literally teeing it up next to his father, Charlie — who hits his drives at least 100 to 120 yards shorter than the field’s biggest bombers — will have his own tee boxes at the Grande Lakes course at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club.
Charlie will be playing from the up-most tees, which, according the scorecard on the course’s website, are about 1,900 yards shorter than the back tees. Also playing those tee boxes will be a couple of legends in Lee Trevino and Gary Player.
The front tees are typically anywhere from 75-150 yards ahead of the tips — on the par-4 1st hole, for example, our Michael Bamberger paced off a difference of 62 yards on Saturday afternoon — so if Charlie can consistently find the fairway, it’ll free up his father to blast away. (On the par-5 18th, pictured at the top of this story, Charlie’s tees are actually at the beginning of the fairway.)
Let the strategizing begin!
