Tiger Woods announced Friday that he will not play the Masters next week, meaning he will miss the year's first major championship for the third time in four years.
The four-time winner of the tournament at Augusta National has been battling back issues again which have kept him from competing since he withdrew from a European Tour event in Dubai on Feb. 3.
He had missed the entire 2015-16 season following two back surgeries and returned to competition in December for the first time at the Hero World Challenge. After a promising performance, Woods was unable to build on it: He missed the cut at the Farmers Insurance Open in January, then the following week pulled out of the Dubai event after just one round.