Tiger Woods one of the early starters in the US Open and gets off to a flyer with a birdie on his first hole

He slammed a driver right down the middle of the 10th fairway, which was his first hole of the event. Returning from all his injury problems, it’s actually off the tee where Tiger has thrived, while it’s the short game that has been rusty.

However, there was nothing wrong with his third shot from the waste area on 10, as he dug the ball out of the sand and got enough grip on the ball to stick it well within birdie range.

Woods then rolled in a 12-footer for birdie on his opening hole

He said he has spent a significant amount of time attempting to sharpen up his short game, given the problems that Pinehurst is likely to throw at the field.

“I did a little bit of work on chipping and putting, but nothing can simulate what we have here, the amount of little shots and knobs and run-offs, and either using wedges or long irons or woods around the greens or even putter,” Woods said.

Paul Kimmage at the Open

“We’ve putted off a lot of greens. It depends how severe the USGA wants to make this and how close they want to get us up to those sides.

“I foresee just like in ’05 watching some of the guys play ‘ping pong’ back and forth. It could happen. This could be one of the Opens where whatever the leading score is, that’s probably as low as we’ll ever go after the first day.”

However, there was a horror start for Matteo Manassero, who was five over after carding a triple-bogey eight on the 10th, his very first hole of the day, and then following up with a double bogey on the 12th.

The 10th hole showed just what can happen on these greens and surrounding areas as he was sitting in a greenside bunker after three shots on the par five but flew the green then fluffed a chip on his way to a dreaded snowman.