Woods secures his sixth crown

Tiger Woods was nowhere near his best yesterday, but still was better than everyone else at Lake Buena Vista in Florida.

Woods struggled with his putter but his closest competitors failed to make a charge, giving Woods his sixth PGA Tour title of the year with a one-stroke triumph.

The red-hot resident of nearby Orlando won this event for the second time despite closing with a one-over-par 73. Woods fired six-under 66s in each of the first three rounds, which gave him a share of the lead with Bob Tway entering the final round.

"I just hung in there today," said Woods, who won here in 1996. "I felt like I was hitting the ball well, but the putter was just not on. I figured if I could hit the ball close enough, one (putt) would fall, but they didn't. I just got lucky today."

Woods had three bogeys today but still finished with a 72-hole total of 17-under 271 to collect a winner's cheque of $450,000, boosting his record total this year to well over $4.7 million.

The world's top-ranked golfer has won six times in his last nine events worldwide. This was his first start since winning the prestigious NEC Invitational in late August, which came two weeks after his PGA Championship victory.

Before last year, no golfer had won $3 million in one season. Woods could reach $6 million this year, considering the first prizes at the season's final two events - the Tour Championship and American Express Championship - total $1.9 million.

Ernie Els shared the lead with Woods after his birdie at number 13, but the South African bogeyed numbers 14 and 17 to finish one shot back. He turned in a one-under 71 to end up alone in second place.

Tway held at least a share of the lead for much of the day until disaster struck at the par-three 12th, where his poorly-struck tee shot found the water. He took triple-bogey and fell out of contention, finishing tied for third with Franklin Langham at 14-under 274.

Each of the final two rounds were played at the par-72, 7,150y-ard Magnolia course at the Walt Disney World resort.

Magnolia and the par-72, 6,957-yard Palm course were each played once by every golfer during the first two rounds.

Leading Final Round Scores (USA unless stated):

271 - T Woods 66 66 66 73

272 - E Els (Rsa) 68 65 68 71

274 - F Langham 67 67 68 72, B Tway 67 65 66 76

275 - J Huston 67 69 72 67, V Singh (Fij) 66 71 69 69

277 - R Cochran 68 69 68 72, D Hart 70 67 67 73, J Sluman 70 65 70 72, G Day 71 68 72 66

279 - W Austin 65 72 73 69, J Carter 67 65 71 76, S Cink 69 70 70 70, S Elkington (Aus) 66 69 71 73, S Hoch 67 71 67 74, S Lowery 70 68 70 71

Others: 282 - J Parnevik (Swe) 69 72 68 73. 283 - G Hjertstedt (Swe) 69 65 72 77.