In August, when Tiger Woods equalled Ben Hogan's record of three major professional triumphs in the same year, he expressed some scepticism about the remarkable achievements attributed to the man they called the Hawk. Now he appears to have had a change of heart.

According to the world number one, he played only two perfect shots on the way to those marvellous victories - on the eighth hole at Pebble Beach in the third round of the US Open and on the long 14th at St Andrews in the final round of the British Open. "Hogan once said that the best week he ever had, he hit only four perfect shots," said Woods. "I have yet to get to that higher level."

He was speaking earlier this month at the Sherwood CC in California, where his own tournament, the 12-man Williams World Challenge, will be played on November 27th to December 3rd. And he candidly admitted that, despite his own best efforts with the underprivileged, "a lot of kids are missing the boat, because they don't have the money to play". By way of proving Woods's point, when Sherwood CC owner David Murdock was asked if his club had any such programmes,he replied. "No. You can't open it up when it's a private club."

Teaser: A player, unable to find his original ball, goes forward and plays a second stroke with his provisional ball from a point nearer the hole than the place where the original ball is likely to be. His original ball is then found and he plays it. What is the ruling?

Answer: When the player played his second stroke with the provisional ball, the original ball was out of play and the provisional ball was in play (Rule 272b). In playing a stroke with a ball out of play (the original ball), the player played a wrong ball and was subject to penalty as prescribed in Rule 15 (loss of hole or two strokes).