There are plenty of vivid details from the car crash that sent Tiger Woods to the hospital. His SUV hit a fire hydrant and a tree; his lips were cut and he had blood in his mouth; his wife smashed a rear window with a golf club to get him out; he briefly lost consciousness.
There are also plenty of questions.
Where was he going at 2:25am on Friday? Why was there no word from the Woods’ camp for nearly 13 hours after the accident?
Police were hoping Woods could answer some of them yesterday.
Two troopers tried to talk to the world’s No. 1 golfer on Friday evening, but his wife said he was sleeping and they agreed to return yesterday, Florida Highway Patrol Sergeant Kim Montes said.
The patrol said Woods had just left his Florida mansion when he lost control of his Cadillac and hit a fire hydrant, then a tree on his neighbor’s property. The report said alcohol was not a factor.
The patrol reported the accident occurred at 2:25am on Friday morning and classified the injuries as serious. The first word from Woods’ camp — some 13 hours after the crash — was that it was a “minor accident” and he was in good condition after being treated at hospital and released.
Windermere police chief Daniel Saylor said his two officers found the 33-year-old Woods lying in the street with his wife, Elin, hovering over him.
“She was frantic, upset,” Saylor said in a briefing on Friday night. “It was her husband laying on the ground.”
Saylor said Woods’ wife told officers she was in the house when she heard the accident and “broke the back window with a golf club.”
He said the front-door windows were not broken and that “the door was probably locked.”
“She supposedly got him out and laid him on the ground,” he said. “He was in and out of consciousness when my guys got there.”
Woods had lacerations to his upper and lower lips, and blood in his mouth, Saylor said. Officers treated Woods for about 10 minutes until an ambulance arrived. Woods was conscious enough to speak, though the police chief said Woods didn’t say anything coherent.
Damage to the front of Woods’ SUV was described by Saylor as “not real extensive, but not real light.”
Left unanswered was where Woods was going at that hour.
His agent, Mark Steinberg, and spokesman, Glenn Greenspan, said there would be no comment beyond the short statement of the accident posted on Friday afternoon on Woods’ Web site that said: “Tiger Woods was in a minor car accident outside his home last night. He was admitted, treated and released today in good condition. We appreciate very much everyone’s thoughts and well wishes.”
Asked at an evening press conference if the couple could have been arguing, Saylor said he had no knowledge of that. The couple, married five years, have two children.
The accident came two days after the National Enquirer published a story alleging that Woods had been seeing a New York night club hostess and that they were together in Melbourne, Australia, where Woods competed in the Australian Masters.
The woman in question, Rachel Uchitel, denied having an affair with Woods when contacted by the Associated Press on Friday.
“I resent my reputation is getting completely blasted in the media,” she said during a telephone interview late on Friday. “Everyone is assuming I came out and said this. This is not a story I have anything to do with.”
Uchitel said she was in Melbourne two weeks ago with clients and never saw Woods the entire time she was there.
A representative of the National Enquirer declined comment.
“Right now we believe this is a traffic crash,” Montes said. “We don’t believe it is a domestic issue.”
The Florida Highway Patrol said a tape of the 911 call won’t be released until it had been reviewed, probably tomorrow at the earliest. Montes said the accident report was not issued for 12 hours because it did not meet the criteria of a serious crash, and the patrol only released information because of inquiries from local media.
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