An eight-time winner at Torrey Pines (Seven Farmers Insurance Open titles, one U.S. Open title/2008), Tiger Woods will make his 2018-19 PGA TOUR Season debut. It marks his first start in an official PGA TOUR event since winning the TOUR Championship for his 80th career TOUR victory.
Woods has won the Farmers Insurance Open seven times. Only he and Phil Mickelson have more than two wins in the event. The Farmers Insurance Open is one of four PGA TOUR events Woods has won seven or more times. The others are the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational (8), the Arnold Palmer Invitational (8) and the WGC-Mexico Championship (7).
Only two players have won a single event eight times on the PGA TOUR: Sam Snead and Tiger Woods and he became the first player to win on the same golf course eight times at the 2013 Farmers Insurance Open. He won in 1999, 2003, 2005-08 and 2013. He has also won eight times at the Bay Hill Club & Lodge (Arnold Palmer Invitational: 2000-03, 2008-09, 2012-13) and the Firestone CC (WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational: 1999-2001, 2005-07, 2009, 2013).
?@TigerWoods, 7-time @FarmersInsOpen champion, joins the media before his 2019 debut at Torrey Pines: https://t.co/56lZrBTLAp
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) January 22, 2019
San Diego native Xander Schauffele, who blitzed the field at the Sentry Tournament of Champions with a final-round 11-under 62, is in search of his third win in his last three starts. He has missed the cut in all three starts at the Farmers Insurance Open.
10 of the 12 Farmers Insurance Open champions have qualified for the FedExCup finale, the TOUR Championship (Scott Stallings/2014 and Tiger Woods/2008). After winning the event in 2008, Tiger Woods was unable to compete in the FedExCup Playoffs due to injury. Woods (2007) and Brandt Snedeker (2012) are the only two players to win the Farmers Insurance Open and the FedExCup in the same season.
Jordan Spieth returns to Torrey Pines, site of his professional debut (2013), for the first time since 2015.
The last eight winners of the Farmers Insurance Open started the week on the South Course. Ben Crane (2010) was the last champion to start play on the North Course.
Defending champion Jason Day is hoping to become a three-time winner of the Farmers Insurance Open and the fourth player to go back-to-back, joining J.C. Snead (1975-76), Phil Mickelson (2000-01) and Tiger Woods (2005-08).
Viktor Hovland (amateur) – The reigning U.S. Amateur champion (Pebble Beach) will make his second PGA TOUR start of the season after missing the cut at the Mayakoba Golf Classic in the fall. Hovland is a junior at Oklahoma State and is from Norway.
Braden Thornberry – The 2017 NCAA champion will make his professional debut. A member of the Web.com Tour, Thornberry finished T4 at the FedEx St. Jude Classic in 2017.
Doug Ghim – Ghim will make his third PGA TOUR start of the season after two starts in the fall. Last week, he finished T45 in his first start on the Web.com Tour at The Bahamas Great Exuma Classic.
