The Tribune

By RENALDO DORSETT

Tribune Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

The 2018 Hero World Challenge tees off today with several compelling storylines to follow, including the host’s return as a legitimate contender, an Albany resident having one of the best seasons of his career and the defending champion’s bid to repeat following last year’s record-setting final round.

For the fourth consecutive year, the $3.5 million Hero World Challenge will be hosted at the Albany resort and continues through Sunday. The event traditionally features 18 of the top golfers on the PGA Tour.

Tournament host Tiger Woods will again be the primary focus of the international golf community following last month’s return to the pinnacle of the sport when he won the Tour Championship. The win was the 80th tour title for Woods – but his first since August 2013.

Woods comes into this event ranked No.13, while less than a year ago he was ranked No. 1,199 following his spinal fusion surgery and a host of other operations.

“Well, one of the great things about the Bahamas is for us to come down here, enjoy the weather, come down here and enjoy just the scenery, the clear water. It’s just very relaxed and very laid back. I think anyone who’s come down here to experience Albany here in particular, everyone always enjoys it. The fact that we have a world-class golf tournament, Hero World Challenge, here just adds to the environment,” Woods said. “We’re excited, and we’re excited to have Hero with us for the next four years. They’ve been an incredible partner over the last four, and this is -- for us, this was our first international event.

“Partnering up with an international global company like Hero has been great for us and what we’re trying to do in our expansion of our foundation and our digital platforms for kids, growing it internationally, Hero’s going to be a big part of that going forward, so we’re excited about that part of it.

“From just a golf side of it, the players have always enjoyed this event, they’ve always come down and have played, and there’s no better place than having it here at Albany here in the Bahamas. Everyone enjoys it. It’s supposed to be great weather for the rest of the week and we’re going to all have some fun.”

Justin Rose, who currently holds the No. 2 position in the Official World Golf Ranking, headlines a field that also includes six players in the top 10. Rose, a native of England but resident at Albany, secured the overall FedEx Cup which determines the season-long PGA Tour champion.

Rose called the tournament a showcase for golf in the Bahamas.

“It’s a nice commute this week for sure, just jump in the golf cart and head up to the course. Obviously, I’ve seen the preparation, everyone’s worked really hard here for a couple months getting the course ready, getting this event ready. So yeah, it’s a fun week, nice to share my home course with the guys that come and play this week,” Rose said.

“It’s at home. I’ve had the fortune to play at home a few times…Playing at home is an interesting feeling for me personally. I’m not sure it’s an advantage really because there’s the off-course distraction that’s so different to your normal routine on Tour. But generally playing in the Bahamas, obviously I think the golf course here at Albany they do a great job of getting it to championship spec, greens are super fast, obviously there’s always a challenge with the wind here. The ocean breeze makes it tricky and demanding, and this golf course is all about keeping it in play so when it gets windy, this course can play really, really tough. It’s nice to showcase the Bahamas obviously, I know there’s so many different islands with different styles of golf courses all over, but there’s surprisingly good golf scattered around the Bahamas and it’s nice to showcase that.”

Rickie Fowler is the tournament’s defending champion and shot a tournament record 61 in the final round last year to clinch the victory.

“Always nice to be back. This is an event that you want to be a part of. That means you’ve done something right or consistently done things right to be [in this field]. I think it kind of goes around to the maybe low 20s in world ranking,” he said, “Yeah, it’s just a nice group to be a part of. Small field, nice way to kind of end the calendar year. And last year was a real nice way to end it, being seven back and birdieing the first seven holes, put myself back in a position to go win. And unfortunately haven’t won since then, so need to win again and get things turned around for the rest of the year.”

A repeat visitor to the Bahamas, Fowler said exploring the islands has been one of his top offseason pastimes.

“It’s always great to be in the Bahamas. My fiancee and I, we spend some time up at Baker’s Bay, which isn’t too far from here up in the Abacos, so we get over to the Bahamas three, four times a year. We always enjoy coming here to Albany. As I was talking about earlier, it’s a nice way to end the calendar year. Yeah, I don’t have anything bad to say about the Bahamas. It’s a nice place to come hang out, relax, and being that we’ve been here on Nassau, I’ve been to the Exumas once, spent time up in the Abacos. I love it. Wish I could get out to go fishing more, but we’ll be golfing this week.”

The Tiger Woods Foundation is the event’s primary charitable beneficiary, along with the Tavistock Foundation and Bahamas Youth Foundation.

Live television coverage of the Hero World Challenge will be provided by Golf Channel during all four rounds and by NBC during the third and fourth rounds. Good-any-day grounds tickets and a limited number of premium hospitality packages for the Hero World Challenge are available for purchase at HeroWorldChallenge.com

Pawan Munjal, chairman, managing director and CEO of Hero Motocorp, officially opened the week-long list of activities surrounding the event alongside Woods at the opening press conference.

“You all know that we already extended the contract for the Hero World Challenge, so this is our fifth year after having completed four, first at Isleworth and three here at Albany. I love it here and I’m sure we all do. The hint he’s trying to give is that it’s not just the Hero World Challenge contract that we extended, we’ve also extended the contract with Tiger as Hero’s corporate partner. I’m very glad, I’m very glad to announce that,” he said, “The first four years for both of us have gone very well, I would say great. The association is absolutely wonderful, very appropriate, very useful for both Hero and Tiger and for me personally. We have carried the brand Hero with Tiger’s brand into many new geographies in these four years, and going forward I’m sure we will be going into many, many more geographies with or without our products, but the brand Hero is surely going across the globe and we’re very happy to attach our brand with Tiger’s.”