Tiger Woods to Return at the Masters

Tiger Woods announces that he will officially return to golf at the Masters next month.
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(Tiger Woods article updated with additional comments from Tiger and information regarding Tiger Woods' sponsors.)

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Tiger Woods will officially return to golf at the Masters tournament next month.

"The Masters is where I won my first major and I view this tournament with great respect," Woods said in a statement. "After a long and necessary time away from the game, I feel like I'm ready to start my season at Augusta." The tournament begins on April 8.

"When I finally got into a position to think about competitive golf again, it became apparent to me that the Masters would be the earliest I could play. I called both Joe Lewis and Arnold Palmer and expressed my regrets for not attending the Tavistock Cup and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. I again want to thank them both for their support and their understanding. Those are fantastic tournaments, and I look forward to competing in them again."

The legendary golfer says that even though he is returning to competition, "I still have a lot of work to do in my personal life," and that he will

continue in therapy.

The last time Woods played was when he won the Australian Masters in November, shortly before his car crash and his personal life erupted in scandal. Woods lost numerous

endorsements

, and his sponsors were

impacted financially.

Woods still has the support of a handful of corporate sponsors, including

EA Sports

(ERTS)

and

Nike (NKE) - Get Report

, but has been dropped by numerous others, including

PepsiCo's (PEP) - Get Report Gatorade,

AT&T (T) - Get Report

and

Accenture (ACN) - Get Report

.

-- Reported by Andrea Tse in New York

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