London, Aug 28: Tiger Woods makes his last scheduled appearance on the 2003 PGA Tour in a new event at this week's Deutsche Bank Championship in Norton, Massachusetts.
Having failed to win a major in a single season for the first time since 1998, the world number one has a special reason for chasing his fifth title of the year this week on his 16th start.

The inaugural Deutsche Bank Championship, which will be played over the Labor Day Weekend at the Tournament Players Club of Boston, offers a purse of $5 million with the Tiger Woods Foundation as its main charity.
"I'm really looking forward to it," said the 27-year-old Woods of the tournament after tying for fourth in the WGC-NEC Invitational at Firestone on Sunday. "It's a good field and the golf course looks to be really tough. It should be a lot of fun."
This week's event will also mark Woods's eighth anniversary as a tournament professional. On August 27, 1996, two days after he triumphed for the third year in a row at the U.S. amateur championship, Woods issued a short statement declaring he had become a pro.



The next day in Milwaukee, the 20-year-old was greeted the media at a news conference with the memorable words: "Hello world..."



Seven years later, Woods has firmly established himself as the game's leading player, and arguably the best of all time. In 141 PGA Tour events, he has won 38 times and was voted the PGA Tour player of the year in 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2002. He is the leading money winner in PGA Tour history with $38,171,348, while his worldwide tournament earnings amount to $46,307,533.



This week, though, Woods faces a strong field at the 7,415-yard par-71 layout with U.S. Open champion Jim Furyk and twice major winner Vijay Singh among his likeliest challengers.



PGA Tour player Brad Faxon, who represents the TPC of Boston and was consulted before changes were made to four of the course's tees, told the Boston Herald on Wednesday he expected a low winning total come Monday.



"I hope people don't expect this to be like even-par wins," said Faxon, who is widely regarded as one of the best putters in the game. "This isn't going to be like the (U.S.) PGA (Championship) was (when only three players finished under par). There'll be some very low scores here."


Bureau Report