Woods takes his battering in style

In this case, it was the calm after the storm, but there were no recriminations from Tiger Woods. His dream of a same-year Grand Slam was destroyed on Saturday by a storm which whipped in with a frenzy off the Firth of Forth; and, although the same piece of Scottish turf was yesterday transformed into a tamer beast, there was no way to resurrect what might have been.

As much as anyone, Woods had been mauled by the freakishness of the meteorological conditions in the third round. An 81, the worst round of his professional career, ruined his chances of adding the British Open to the US Masters and US Open he had already collected this season. Yesterday, he carded a 65 for level-par 284, but leaving the best until last was little consolation.

Although his domination of the majors had been halted, even if it is only temporarily, Woods insisted that, by year's end, he would reflect on "a great season".

"Everybody tends to lose perspective on how difficult it is to win a major championship. Anytime you can win one major in a year, it is going to be a successful year."

On Saturday, Woods had handled himself with great dignity after perishing in the conditions and, yesterday he was still gracious in defeat.

"It was just a brutal day, and I played in some of the toughest conditions I'd ever seen. I wasn't hitting the ball very well on top of that, so it just kind of compounded the problem. It was one of those fluke days that you had to throw out. It fell right out of the window."

The conditions were extreme. On one hole, the fifth, Woods "absolutely ripped" a five-iron and it went 135 yards. On the fourth, a par three of 213 yards, where players had been hitting eight-iron in practice, his playing partner, Mark O'Meara, failed to reach with a driver. For the guts of two hours, during the worst of it, golf was turned into a lottery.

As a golfing traditionalist, what happened in the third round hasn't put him off what the British Open is all about.

"This is an Open Championship. This is the oldest championship there is in our sport; one that all the players respect and have great admiration for," said Woods.

Next year, he'll be back in Sandwich and trying as hard as ever to retrieve that Claret Jug.