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Asked to rate the PGA Tour event he hosts on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the perfect tournament, Tiger Woods could not come up with a number. But in the mind of the top player in the Official World Golf Ranking, the AT&T National is pushing the top of the scale.
"I'd say pretty far up there," Woods said. "We're learning each and every year, and we've only done it twice."
During a stop at Congressional Country Club for the tournament's Media Day in April, Woods sat down with The Gazette and discussed his three-year-old relationship with Montgomery County and the future of the PGA Tour stop that bears his name.
Woods hails originally from Cypress, Calif., and resides in Windermere, Fla. His relationship with the Washington, D.C. area was an accident of history, and did not materialize until two years ago.
Montgomery County's previous PGA Tour event, most recently named the Booz Allen Classic, folded in late 2006. The same fate befell the Tour's regular July 4 event, The International in Denver, in February 2007.
Woods and the Tour combined the nation's capital with July 4 weekend to create a new event, and added the U.S. military to that patriotic theme, donating 30,000 tickets annually to service men and women based in the region.
"We didn't think we'd get a tournament for a number of years, if ever," Woods said. "And all of a sudden, the stars aligned for this one moment. We've got the nation's birthday, we have the military, and we put together a tournament in just over 100 days."
Woods has maintained since the tournament's inception, and reiterated to The Gazette, that he wants the AT&T National to be played at Congressional for its duration. In 2010 and 2011, the event will be held at Aronimink Golf Club in Newtown Square, Pa., while the Blue Course prepares to host the 2011 U.S. Open.
A completely redesigned TPC Potomac at Avenel Farms, owned and operated by the PGA Tour, also sits right down the road from Congressional. When pressed, however, Woods said only that he is "happy where [the AT&T National] is at right now," and the Congressional membership voted in the fall to extend the tournament's stay through 2014, with the option for an additional three years, through 2017.
"As you know from the support they've had over the years here … people have always turned out," Woods said. "This is a great golfing town."
The relationship is mutually beneficial. Tiger Woods Foundation President and CEO Greg McLaughlin said Monday that 10 students from the area are on college scholarships funded in part from AT&T National proceeds.
"Any city we go into, we're going to help underprivileged kids, no matter what," Woods said. "It just happened to be here in D.C., because of this tournament. But I think we've just scratched the surface of what we can do and what we're going to do."
He also said the tournament, like his golf swing, undergoes regular fine-tuning. It came together quickly in 2007, and Woods himself was unable to participate last year following knee surgery.
But he has been pleased with the AT&T National thus far, saying his favorite moment was the ceremonial opening tee shot by former President George H.W. Bush in 2007. Woods expects only better in the future.
"This year will be even better than previous years, just because of experience," he said. "The support we've gotten from the local community here, and obviously the military, their support, it just makes it so special."