Tiger up and on top in Down Under

MELBOURNE, Australia – Tiger Woods lived up to eight months of anticipation in Australia by running off three straight birdies late in his round of a 6-under 66 that put him atop the leaderboard in the Australian Masters on Thursday.

Playing for the first time Down Under in 11 years, before an enormous gallery only seen at major championships, Woods putted for birdie on every hole until the last one. He pulled his drive into a tea tree, chopped out into the rough and took two putts from 40 feet for his lone bogey.

Among early starters, Woods shared the lead with James Nitties of Australia, coming off his rookie season on the PGA Tour, and Branden Grace of South Africa.

Woods missed only two fairways in a round that was relatively free of stress. He hit a driver off the tee five times and, apart for the final hole, kept it in play and away from the trouble. Woods chose to lay back from the bunkers on several of the short par 4s at Kingston Heath, and a couple of times hit poor shots or played purposely away from the flags.

“You play for what it’s giving you,” Woods said. “I didn’t have to change my game plan on any hole.”

He made his move toward the end of the round, hitting 3-wood to the 294-yard sixth hole that held its line to the left of the bunkers and came up just short of the green, leaving an easy chip to within a foot. After a poor tee shot left him a bad angle to the green on the seventh, Woods hit an 8-iron over the corner of trees to 20 feet for another birdie, then hit an 8-iron to 7 feet on the third.

Far more impressive than the golf, however, was the gallery.

Traffic was backed up along Kingston Road outside the club for kilometers (miles) in the hour before Woods tee off.

“I know,” he said. “I was stuck in it, too.”

The tournament has been a sellout for months, and it remains peculiar to see a ticket window at an Australian golf tournament with a sign that says “Sold out.” The cap was at 100,000 tickets for the week. (AP)