KEY POINTS:
The last time Tiger Woods returned to competitive golf after knee surgery, he won three of his next four tournaments. That was in 2003. More recently though, we remember how he played after a two-month break in 2006 during the illness and death of his father. At the
US Open in New York that year, he missed the cut in a major championship for the only time in his professional career.
So as we get set for this week's US Open, the first to be played in southern California since 1948, surely the most asked question will be "how will Tiger play?"
He had surgery on his left knee on April 15. As of last Monday he hadn't played a full 18 holes since.
The outcome of his much anticipated return is likely to be more akin to what happened in 2003 than in 2006. He will be mentally fresh, superbly fit and he'll be playing at a venue where he's won the Buick Invitational six times, including the last four in succession.
Torrey Pines in La Jolla, about 20 minutes' drive from downtown San Diego, and actually owned by the city, is just the second public course to host a US Open. The other is Bethpage in New York which held the tournament when Tiger won in 2002 and which will hold it again next year.
The Torrey Pines setting, above 100m-high cliffs next to the Pacific, is among the most spectacular anywhere in golf. If you can get on, a round will cost you US$145 ($190).
There are actually two courses there and, while the Buick Invitational each February is played over both the North and South layouts, the Open is only on the more demanding South course. Phil Mickelson said last week that it may well be the most difficult in the world. The numbers suggest why.
At around 6800m, it's five per cent longer than any course used for a US Open, although it will have a par of 71. There are two par fours over 450m, or 500 yards, and two par fives in excess of 550m. To those almost frightening figures, add the USGA's perverse delight in not seeing players under par.
So the usual conditions have been imposed - greens running at a super slick 4m out of the stimpmeter, fairways between just 20m and 30m wide and three bands of tangly kikuyu grass rough, the deepest of which will be cut at 18cm.
It all means a golf course significantly different to the one played in the Buick Invitational.
But it doesn't alter the fact that Tiger Woods will be the favourite to win and stop a four-year run of non-American winners. Woods - in 2000 and 2002 - and Jim Furyk, the 2003 winner, are the only home-grown US Open champions this century.
Michael Campbell, exempt into this tournament till 2015 as a consequence of his famous win at Pinehurst, is the only New Zealander in the field. No other Kiwi appears to have made final qualifying.
But the course, and the way the USGA set it up, is too much for one of the hottest players. Kenny Perry, winner of the Memorial tournament last week and fifth on the PGA Tour money list, is not exempt into the Open. In order to get a start, he had to play a 36-hole qualifying tournament the day after his win, and hope to finish in the top 23 out of 140 players in the field.
Stating that he "hated" Torrey Pines, Perry had a sleep-in instead.