Ohio’s annual Tiger Woods Benefit Drive, otherwise known as the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational, starts today on Firestone Country Club’s famous South Course where the world no. 1 has banked an incredible $6,587,400 since the 1997 NEC World Series of Golf (the NEC World Series became the WGC NEC Invitational in 1999 and the Bridgestone last year).

There aren’t many courses that don’t suit Woods’s game, but nowhere, it seems, does he feel quite so comfortable as he does over Firestone’s tree-lined 7,360 yards. He has won at Augusta National four times, but also finished T22nd there during his “slump” in 2004. He’s won the Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines five times, but finished tied for 10th there that same awful, 14 top-10s year of 2004. He won at Bay Hill every year from 2000 to 2003, but in 1999 stumbled into the clubhouse at two over par, tied for 56th. In nine stroke play events at Firestone, he has won five times and never finished worse than tied for fifth. In 2000, he shot a course and tournament record 259 for 72 holes, with the help of a second round 61, and won by 11 strokes. Last year, he beat Stewart Cink in a playoff after the pair had finished at 10 under par.

A sixth Bridgestone win and 14th WGC title in all for Woods is certainly the most likely outcome. However, although he stills tops the world rankings by more than 10 points over Jim Furyk, leads the chase for the FedEx Cup by 1,829 points from second-placed Vijay Singh despite having played 10 events fewer, is currently $786,469 ahead of Singh on the money list, and has an adjusted scoring average of .43 better than the Fijian, Woods comes into the tournament in less than scintillating form — his last win coming at the Wachovia Championship in May. He tied for 37th at the Players the week after the Wachovia, struggled to a tie for sixth at his own event in Washington, and failed to land either the U.S. or British Opens. Last time out, at Carnoustie, his approach shots invariably stopped too far from the hole for him to capitalize on what he described as one of the best putting weeks of his season. At Oakmont, his iron play was altogether better but the wicked greens saw him putting perhaps too defensively.

His affinity for Firestone will obviously serve Woods well this week, but a malfunction with any part of his game could see him succumb to a typically strong field. Indeed, all but two dozen or so of the 84 players who will tee it up this weekend should be considered genuine contenders. The likes of Anton Haig, Jose Manuel Lara, Thongchai Jaidee, Liang Wen-Chong, and Yong-Eun Yang, who all qualified by winning significant events around the world, are undoubtedly fine players and worthy of their place, but one suspects the prospect of taking on the world’s top 50 on such a demanding course with $8 million up for grabs might be somewhat overwhelming.

Those who are likely to fight Woods all the way include last week’s winner Furyk, assuming his injured upper back holds up; Singh who has a decent if unspectacular record at Firestone with nine top-15 finishes in 11 starts; Sergio Garcia, who will surely start winning big tournaments again just as soon as he turns his half empty glass the right way up and stops with all the pity party, doom and gloom, “why me?” nonsense; Paul Casey, who finished in the top 10 at both the Masters and U.S. Open and tied for fourth here last year, and Mike Weir, whose remodeled swing has been steadily improving all season and who is desperate to play his way on to the International team for the Presidents Cup.

Then there’s Padraig Harrington, of course, who will either ride the wave of confidence his Open Championship victory earned him or crash and burn under the colossal weight of jet lag, too many late nights celebrating, press requests, and a feeling of anti-climax; Hunter Mahan, who hasn’t finished outside the top 20 in his last six events and won the Travelers Championship in June, and the Argentinean pair of U.S. Open champion Angel Cabrera and Andres Romero who, but for a terrible club selection and even worse luck at the 71st hole at Carnoustie, would have joined his countryman as a first time major winner. A fortnight ago, Romero stood 114th in the world rankings, but by finishing third at the Open and winning his first European Tour event in Germany on Sunday, the 26-year-old rose to 29th. Romero now gets to play the PGA Championship next week and partner with Woods this week at a tournament that may not be as prestigious and distinct as Tim Finchem and the International Federation of PGA Tours hoped it might be by now. (How about taking these “World” Golf Championships around the world, changing the title sponsors less frequently or, better still, having no sponsors at all, and spacing them out a bit better?) But, for Romero and the 34 other members of the European Tour present, it’s probably preferable to a trip to Moscow for the European Tour’s Russian Open where the first place prize money is a third of what Tiger Woo … sorry, the winner, will pick up here on Sunday.