FARMINGDALE, N.Y. (Reuters) - John Daly has requested a cart for this week’s PGA Championship because he suffers with arthritis but will be restricted on where he is allowed to drive it, organizers said on Tuesday. FILE PHOTO: Golf - The 146th Open Championship - Royal Birkdale - Southport, Britain - July 19, 2017 USA’s John Daly in action during a practice round REUTERS/Hannah McKay Rain over the past couple of days has left Bethpage Black soft in places and, though it should dry out somewhat before Thursday’s first round, it could still be a problem driving a cart inside the ropes without causing damage to the fairways. “I will meet with John and just talk through where he can and can’t go,” said the PGA of America’s Kerry Haigh. “We try and use common sense, what’s reasonable, what’s fair for the protection both of the player... as well as the playing of a major championship.” Daly, 53, applied to ride a cart under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), citing an arthritic right knee. “We have an ADA committee which includes a medical expert and they review the information, and it was agreed that it (Daly’s condition) justified the use of a cart for this championship,” Haigh said. It will be the first major in seven years where a player has not walked and, though 1991 champion Daly is unlikely to make the cut this week let alone contend for victory, the decision to allow him to use a cart does not sit well with all the players. Six-times major champion Nick Faldo said last week that walking was an integral part of being a professional golfer and Tiger Woods weighed in on Tuesday with a thinly-veiled dig. “As far as J.D. (Daly) taking a cart, well I walked with a broken leg, so...” said Woods, who did not finish his sentence, figuring he had made his point. Woods was referring to the 2008 U.S. Open, which he famously won despite a double stress fracture in his left tibia. Bethpage Black is a long and hilly walk and weary legs will still be a factor. “There’s going to be a component of stamina as the week goes on,” Woods said. “Four days over a tough championship that is mentally and physically taxing takes its toll.”<doc-sep>He also withdrew from last year’s British Open, an event in which he can participate through age 60 after winning it in 1995, claiming his arthritis was “unbearable.” In a tweet at the time, Daly said, “It would have been nice to have gotten a cart but unfortunately was turned down by our tour board.”<doc-sep>AP John Daly has been approved to use a cart next week in the PGA Championship because of arthritis in his right knee that he says keeps him from walking more than six holes on the golf course. He will be the first player to ride a cart in a major championship since Casey Martin in the U.S. Open at Olympic Club in 1998 and 2012. "I hope I don't get a lot of grief from the fans," Daly said in a telephone interview. "My knee is screwed. I had the meniscus cut out. I have osteoarthritis so bad ... I can walk up a hill, I just can't walk down one." The PGA of America said Daly applied to use a cart through its American with Disabilities Act policy and provided "the requisite information to allow for a review of his request by the PGA's medical team." "The request was reviewed and approved," the PGA said in a statement. The PGA Championship starts May 16 at Bethpage Black, a notoriously tough public course — inside and outside the ropes — on Long Island. Daly has a lifetime exemption from winning the PGA Championship in 1991 at Crooked Stick as the ninth alternate. That's when the golf world was introduced to his "grip it and rip it" game. Now he'll be gripping the steering wheel of a cart. A PGA spokesman said the 53-year-old Daly would be assigned a cart with no roof. Netflix star:Alexa Pano, 14, qualifies for first U.S. Women's Open in playoff Medal of Freedom:Tiger Woods receives honor from Donald Trump at White House Opinion:Babe Didrikson Zaharias deserves Presidential Medal of Freedom Martin, a former teammate of Tiger Woods at Stanford, suffers from Klippel-Trenaunay-Weber Syndrome, which restricts circulation in the lower portion of his right leg and made it virtually impossible for him to walk 18 holes a day over four rounds. He had a single-rider cart when he qualified for the 1998 U.S. Open and tied for 23rd, and he successfully sued the PGA Tour in a case that went to the U.S. Supreme Court. Martin, now the golf coach at Oregon, qualified for the U.S. Open again in 2012 when it was at Olympic Club and missed the cut. Daly, a two-time major champion, regularly plays the PGA Tour Champions, a 50-and-older circuit that allows for carts. He last played a tournament without a cart last September at the Omega European Masters in Switzerland on the European Tour. WANT MORE? : Get the lowdown on golf at GolfWeek SPORTS, DELIVERED: Get latest news right in your inbox! He tried to get a cart for the U.S. Senior Open last year in Colorado, and the USGA turned him down. The USGA said the information Daly submitted with his request did not support a waiver to ride, and that Daly chose not to provide additional information to support his request. The question now is whether he even makes it to the PGA Championship. Daly tied for 27th last week at the Insperity Invitational in Houston, and withdrew from the Regions Tradition, the first senior major of the year, because of illness. He said he was suffering dizzy spells during the drive toward Alabama. "Massive dizzy spells, and I'm diabetic now," Daly said. "I was driving the bus from Houston, trying to make it to Birmingham, and pulled off the road six times." He says he made it to Philadelphia, Mississippi, and was playing the slot machines. "The whole thing (stinks)," Daly said. "Florida sends me a handicap sticker when I'm there. It's embarrassing. But I can't walk more than six holes before the whole knee swells up, and then I can't go anymore." Daly said he planned to see a doctor in the next few days about the dizzy spells, which he said used to affect his mother. Daly was nicknamed "Wild Thing" when he first appeared on the PGA Tour as a rookie in 1991 for the way he played and lived. He won the British Open at St. Andrews in 1995, and the last of his five PGA Tour victories was in 2004 at Torrey Pines in the Buick Invitational. He won the Insperity Invitational on the PGA Tour Champions two years ago.<doc-sep>
Doug Pensinger/Getty Images Tiger Woods hesitated during his PGA Championship press conference Tuesday before he appeared to criticize the PGA of America's decision to allow John Daly to use a cart during this week's tournament because of a chronic knee injury. "I walked with a broken leg, so..." Tiger said. Daly, who won the 1991 PGA Championship, told Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press a cart is the only way for him to compete. "The whole thing (stinks)," he said. "Florida sends me a handicap sticker when I'm there. It's embarrassing. But I can't walk more than six holes before the whole knee swells up, and then I can't go anymore." The 53-year-old California native noted he's worried about the type of reception he'll get at the famed Bethpage Black Course in New York after the PGA of America approved his cart request via the Americans with Disabilities Act. "I hope I don't get a lot of grief from the fans," Daly told Ferguson. "My knee is screwed. I had the meniscus cut out. I have osteoarthritis so bad ... I can walk up a hill, I just can't walk down one." Meanwhile, Woods' victory on a broken leg in the 2008 U.S. Open, his last major championship triumph before he won The Masters last month, is one of golf's defining moments. Video Play Button Videos you might like The 15-time major champion has never had an issue with Daly, who's known for his ups and downs and a high-risk, high-reward playing style—"I have always been a John Daly fan and a friend," Woods said in 2012—but he's always been a stickler for the game's rules and traditions. In that regard, he's got plenty of support from the sport's traditionalists. "I think walking is an integral part of being a pro golfer," Nick Faldo, a six-time major champion and current CBS golf analyst, told reporters on a conference call when asked about Daly. "I'll leave it at that." That said, the only way Daly's cart becomes a major story during the tournament is if he manages to contend for the season's second major title, and that's highly unlikely. Vegas Insider lists him with 1000-1 odds to win the PGA Championship, he hasn't recorded a PGA Tour top-10 finish since the Puerto Rico Open in March 2015 and his last Tour win came at the Buick Invitational in February 2004.