The U.S. Open returns to Winged Foot this week for the first time since 2006.
Ahead of this week's U.S. Open, Tiger Woods knows he'll play on a tough course at Winged Foot in Mamaroneck, N.Y.
When asked where it ranks among the hardest courses he's ever played in competition, he didn't hesitate to grade its "sheer difficulty."
"Well, I think it's right up there next to Oakmont and I think Carnoustie as far as just sheer difficulty without even doing anything to it,'' Woods told reporters at a news conference on Tuesday. "I think those three golf courses, they can host major championships without ever doing anything to them.
"This one or Oakmont here is either one or two.''
The 2018 Open Championship was held at Carnoustie in Scotland, while Oakmont has hosted numerous U.S. Opens, including the 2016 event won by Dustin Johnson.
This week, the U.S. Open returns to Winged Foot for the first time since 2006. Geoff Ogilvy won at 5 over par that year after Phil Mickelson's disastrous double-bogey on the 18th hole. Woods missed the cut–his first time doing so in a major–after he shot back-to-back rounds of 76.
Winged Foot, which is a par-70 with only two par-5s, presents a tall challenge this weekend. Many golfers, including Woods, are expecting scoring similar to Ogilvy's given the course's narrow fairways and tricky rough.
"The golf course is going to be hard," Woods said, per Golf Channel. "It depends on how difficult they want to set up these pins to give us a chance at it. But with the forecast, it's going to be difficult no matter what."