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Tiger Woods claimed his first victory in 749 days on Sunday with his win over Zach Johnson at the Chevron World Challenge.

The win marked the first time Woods held an individual trophy in over two years, dating back to his win at the JBWere Australian Open in 2009.

It was after that win that the National Enquirer ran their story about Woods’ infidelities that would subsequently end his marriage, his life as he knew it and his winning ways for quite some time.

However, we’re not here to talk about Tiger’s transgressions or his flaws. This a golf blog, so let’s concentrate on the golf.

Now, there have been those who said that this win means nothing for Woods. That he isn’t automatically “back” with a silly-season victory over a hand-picked group of just 17 other golfers.

That’s fine. No argument here. There are more than a few shortcomings with his win in Thousand Oaks. First of all, there were only 18 people in the entire tournament. The Chevron is not a PGA Tour-sanctioned event. Taking place in December, there is little doubt that those 18 players are not as honed-in as they would be on a normal event.

All of that is true, but the one thing that remains is that Woods won.

He won. End of story. There’s no reason to talk about him being “back,” or if this means he will go on to break Jack Nicklaus’ major championship record. The simple fact is that this win on December 4th, 2011 is a start.

It’s a start back on that path of winning tournaments and maybe even majors. No one can say definitively if Woods is “back” after the first 72 holes he has put together that was (barely) enough to take a tournament, but again, that’s not the point.

No one will agree that Tiger’s back until he has another season like he had in 2007 or 2008. Woods needs to win multiple times on Tour and add another major to his total.

Then, maybe, people will start to come around to the idea that he is “back.”

That scenario is a big “IF.”

No one knows what the future holds for Tiger Woods. Sure, it looks as if his swing is back in check, his short game has returned and he’s able to will the ball into the hole like he used to, but what’s to say that it wasn’t a fluke?

The younger competitors aren’t scared of Woods like his comtemporaries appeared to be in 2000-2008. That newly-formed competitor may make it harder on Woods to regain his grip on the golfing world.

No one knows.

All this win can be seen as is a start. A step in the right direction. A win is a win is a win, no matter who he did or didn’t beat.

To look at Woods’ victory at the Chevron as anything other than a good sign would be cynical and misguided. One tournament isn’t going to dictate whether or not Woods’ game is where it needs to be to compete on the toughest courses in the world, week in and week out, but one thing is for sure: it’s definitely not a bad thing.