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Tiger Woods

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Tiger Woods
Personal information
Sporting nationalityUSA
ResidenceOrlando, Florida
Career
CollegeStanford University (dropped out)
Highest ranking1 (June 15, 1997)[1]
(683 weeks)

Eldrick Tonter "Tiger" Woods (born December 30, 1975, in Cypress, California) is an American golfer, widely considered to be one of the greatest golfers of all time. In 2005, at the age of 29, he won his 10th major golf championship, placing him fourth on the all-time list behind Jack Nicklaus, Walter Hagen and Bobby Jones. He has more wins on the PGA Tour than any other active golfer. Woods, who is of mixed race, is credited with prompting a major surge of interest in the game of golf among minorities and young people in the United States.

Background and family

Woods' father, Earl Woods is a Vietnam War veteran and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, of mixed Black, Chinese and Native American ancestry. He is now the chairman of his son's charitable foundation, the Tiger Woods Foundation (see section Charity and youth projects below). Woods' mother, Kultida Woods, is originally from Thailand, and is of mixed Thai, Chinese, and Dutch ancestry. This makes Woods himself one quarter Chinese, one quarter Thai, one-quarter African American, one eighth Native American, and one eighth Dutch[1]. He refers to his ethnic make-up as Cablinasian (a portmanteau of Caucasian, Black, American-Indian, and Asian), a term he made up himself.

Woods' actual given name is 'Eldrick'. He was given the nickname 'Tiger' at birth, after Vuong Dang Phong, a Vietnamese war comrade of his father's, and became generally known by that name. By the time he achieved national prominence in junior and amateur golf, he was simply known as "Tiger Woods".

In 2004, Woods became engaged to Elin Nordegren, a Swedish model. They were introduced by Swedish golf star Jesper Parnevik, who had employed her as a nanny. They married on October 5, 2004 and live at Isleworth, a community in Windermere, a suburb of Orlando, Florida. They also have homes in Jackson, Wyoming, California and Sweden. In January 2006, Woods and his wife purchased a $38 million residential property in Jupiter Island, Florida, which they intend to make their primary residence. Woods' Jupiter Island neighbors will include golfers Greg Norman and Nick Price, as well as singers Céline Dion and Alan Jackson. In 2006 Woods was named Forbes highest paid athlete [2].

Amateur career

Woods was a child prodigy who began to play golf at age three. In an interview with 60 Minutes that aired on March 26, 2006, Woods explained that he suffered from a severe stuttering problem when he was younger. While still a small child, he demonstrated his golf skills in a television appearance on the Mike Douglas Show. In 1984, he won the 9-10 boys' event at the Junior World Golf Championships; Tiger was only eight years old at the time, but 9-10 was the youngest age group available. Tiger went on to win the Junior World Championships six times, including four consecutive wins from 1988-1991. Woods then won the U.S. Junior Amateur title in 1991, 1992, and 1993; he remains the event's youngest-ever winner. He followed this by becoming the only person to win three consecutive U.S. Amateur titles over the next three years. With his first US Amateur win in 1994 over Trip Kuehne, the year that he graduated high school, he became the youngest player ever to win that event. His five USGA Championships before age 20 qualify him for consideration as having the greatest under-20 golf career of all time. He attended Stanford University and won one NCAA individual championship. In 1996, Woods decided to leave Stanford after two years to pursue professional golf.

Professional career

Tiger Woods giving a driving demonstration aboard the USS George Washington.

With the announcement, "Hello World," [3] Tiger Woods became a professional golfer in August 1996, playing his first round of professional golf at the Greater Milwaukee Open. His caddy was George Wutton. He won two events in the next three months, and was named 1996's "Sportsman of the Year" by Sports Illustrated for the enormous impact he had on the game of golf even as a rookie. The following April, Woods won The Masters by a record margin of 12 strokes, and has been by far the highest-profile golfer in the world ever since. On 15 June 1997 [4], Woods rose to the number one spot in the Official World Golf Rankings for the first time, though he was quickly supplanted by Ernie Els, and then David Duval.

Woods has formed a close friendship with leading PGA Tour professional Mark O'Meara, though O'Meara is almost twenty years his senior. O'Meara acted as a mentor to Woods for a time, and the two men won the 1999 World Cup of Golf together. The inspiration of working closely with Tiger was widely regarded as a catalyst for O'Meara's own career year in 1998, when he won the only two majors of his career.

Despite suggestions that the other players would only be competing for second place from now on, Woods' form began to fade in the second half of 1997, and in 1998 he only won one PGA Tour event. In June 1999, Woods won the Memorial Tournament, a victory that marked the beginning of perhaps the greatest sustained period of dominance in the history of men's golf. He would go on to win seventeen PGA Tour events in the two calendar years that followed, and 32 in the next five, both achievements that had not been rivaled in several decades. Also in late 1999, Tiger embarked on a record-setting streak of 264 consecutive weeks atop the Official World Golf Rankings. During the run, Woods won seven out of the eleven major championships, starting with the 1999 PGA Championship at Medinah Country Club and finishing with the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage Black. Woods broke Old Tom Morris' record for the largest victory margin ever in a major championship, which had stood since 1862, with his 15-shot win in the 2000 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. In the 2000 British Open at St Andrews, Woods set the record for lowest score to par (-19) in any major tournament, and he holds at least a share of that record in all four major championships. His major championship streak was seriously threatened at the 2000 PGA Championship, however, when upstart Bob May went head-to-head with Woods on Sunday at Valhalla in Louisville, matching Tiger stroke-for-stroke. Woods only escaped with his third straight major on the second playoff hole, where he made par and May's roller-coaster putt to tie missed by mere inches. The next season, though, Woods went back to dominating: his 2001 Masters win marked the only time anyone had ever won four consecutive majors, a feat which has become known as the "Tiger Slam". His adjusted scoring average of 67.79 in 2000 was the lowest in PGA TOUR history, lower than his 68.43 average in 1999. His actual scoring average of 68.17 in 2000 was the lowest in PGA TOUR history, including Byron Nelson's 68.33 average in 1945.

The next phase of Woods' career saw him remain among the top competitors on the tour, but lose his dominating edge. He did not win a major in 2003 or 2004, and fell to second in the PGA Tour money list in 2003 and to fourth on 2004. In September 2004, Woods' record streak as the world's top-ranked golfer came to an end at the Deutsche Bank Championship in Norton, Massachusetts, when Vijay Singh won the tournament and overtook Woods in the rankings. Even though no one has held the number one ranking for more total weeks than Woods, many commentators were puzzled by Tiger's "slump," offering explanations that ranged from Tiger's rift with swing coach Butch Harmon to his recent marriage to Elin Nordegren. At the same time, Woods let it be known that he was once again working on changes to his swing -- this time in hopes of reducing the wear and tear on his surgically-repaired left knee, which was subjected to severe stress in the 1998-2003 version of his swing. Again, Woods anticipated that once the adjustments were complete, he would return to his previous form.

In the 2005 PGA Tour season, Woods quickly returned to his winning ways. On March 6, he outdueled Phil Mickelson to win the Ford Championship at Doral, and returned to the Official World Golf Rankings' number one position in the process (though Singh displaced him once again two weeks later). On April 10, Woods finally broke his "drought" in the majors by winning the 2005 Masters in a tie-breaking playoff, which also assured him the number one spot in the World Rankings again. Singh and Woods swapped the Number 1 position several times over the next couple of months, but by early July, Woods had established a substantial advantage, propelled further by a victory in The (British) Open Championship, a win that also gave him his 10th major. Tiger went on to win six official money events on the PGA Tour in 2005, topping the money list for the sixth time in his career. Woods' 2005 wins also included two at the World Golf Championships; he has won in 10 of his 19 career individual World Golf Championships appearances for an incredible 0.526 winning percentage.

To date, Woods has won 48 official money events on the PGA Tour, 18 other individual professional titles, and two team titles in the two-man WGC-World Cup. He owns the lowest career scoring average and the most career earnings of any player in PGA Tour history. Tiger is one of only five players (along with Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus, and Gary Player) in the history of golf to have won all four professional major championships in his career (known as the "Career Grand Slam"). With his win in the 2005 Open Championship, he became only the second golfer, after Nicklaus, to have won all four majors more than once. At the 2003 TOUR Championship, he set an all-time record for most consecutive cuts made with 114 (passing Byron Nelson's previous record of 113), and extended this mark to 142 before it ended on May 13, 2005 at the EDS Byron Nelson Championship. The streak started in 1998[5]. Many commentators consider this one of the most remarkable golf accomplishments of all time, given the margin by which he broke the old record (and against much stronger fields than those in Nelson's day) and given that during the streak, the next longest streak by any other player was usually only in the 10s or 20s.

The only dissapointment so far in Tiger's career has been his relatively poor performances in the Ryder cup particularly in the team section of that competition. Some believe the pressure on Woods is too great at this competition and it is clear that he is not entirely comfortable with the event’s playing format. In his four previous Cup matches his record is a mediocre return of seven wins, 11 losses and two halves. Not what many expect of the world's number one.

Woods won the "World Sportsman of the Year" award at the Laureus World Sports Awards in 2000 and 2001. He is the only individual two-time winner of Sports Illustrated magazine's "Sportsman of the Year" award (1996, 2000). In many experts' eyes, Tiger's career accomplishments through 2005 (remarkably, all before the age of 30) qualify him for consideration as the greatest golfer of all time.

Playing style

When Woods burst onto the professional golf scene in 1996, one of the things that made the biggest impact on fans was his prodigious driving. However, when he refused to upgrade his technology in the following years (insisting upon the use of True Temper Dynamic Gold steel-shafted clubs and smaller steel clubheads that promoted accuracy over distance), many opponents caught up to him, a trend that became obvious during the 2002-2003 PGA Tour seasons -- Phil Mickelson even made a crack in 2003 about Tiger using "inferior equipment". During 2004, Woods finally upgraded his driver technology to a titanium clubhead and graphite shaft which helped improve his already amazing length off the tee. He currently plays True Temper Dynamic Gold steel shafts in his irons and Grafalloy BiMatrx Prototype graphite shaft in his driver.

Despite his length advantage, Woods has always focused on developing an excellent all-around game. Although in recent years he has typically been near the bottom of the Tour rankings in driving accuracy [6], his iron play is generally as accurate as any player ever to play (including Jack Nicklaus), his recovery and bunker play is often brilliant (for example, his miraculous 30-foot chip-in at Augusta's 16th during the 2005 Masters), and his putting (especially under pressure) is possibly his greatest asset. He is largely responsible for a shift to higher standards of athleticism amongst professional golfers, and is known for putting in more hours of practice than most. [citation needed]

Early in his professional career, Woods worked almost exclusively with leading swing coach Butch Harmon, but since March 2004, he has been coached by Hank Haney. In June 2004, Woods was involved in a media spat with Harmon, who also works as a golf broadcaster, when Harmon suggested that he was in "denial" about the problems in his game, but they publicly patched up their differences.

Although he is considered one of the most charismatic figures in golf's history, Woods' approach is, at its core, cautious. He aims for consistency: although he is better than any other Tour player when he is in top form, his dominance comes not from posting extremely low rounds (though he has been known to do that from time to time), but rather from avoiding bad rounds. To illustrate, the standard deviations of Woods' 18-hole scores are typically lower than those of most Tour players. Tiger plays fewer tournaments than most professionals (20-23 per year, compared to the typical 25-30), and focuses his efforts on preparing for (and peaking at) the Majors and the most prestigious of the other tournaments. Woods' manner off of the course is cautious as well, as he carries himself in interviews and public appearances with a carefully controlled demeanor. One of the few breaches of Tiger's fan-friendly image occurred during the 2000 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, on the 18th tee in the second round. Hitting driver, Woods snap-hooked his tee shot into the Pacific Ocean, then let loose with a rich stream of expletives that NBC's microphones captured in real time. But while the USGA received several calls from offended viewers, Tiger quickly apologized.

Tiger almost always wears a shirt in the shade of various reds on the final round (usually on Sundays) of every tournament in which he plays, as he believes the color red symbolizes aggression and assertiveness.[7]. Woods also puts tape on his middle and ring fingers before playing on Sundays, but not for medical reasons.

Memorable golfing shots

The following are generally regarded to be the most memorable shots from the career of Tiger Woods.

  • 2005 Masters - Augusta National Golf Club - final round - 16th hole - lob wedge - chip from 30 feet, from side of green, with a very difficult lie, rolled down steep slope, nearly stopped, then went in for birdie.
  • 2003 Buick Invitational - Torrey Pines South - final round - 15th hole - 4-iron - 203 yards under branches over bunkers to green
  • 2002 PGA Championship - Hazeltine National Golf Club - second round - 18th hole - 3-iron - 202 yard carry over tall trees from fairway bunker
  • 2001 Players Championship - TPC at Sawgrass - third round - 17th hole - putter - 60 foot downhill putt on famous island green; eventually won by 1 stroke. Known as the "better than most" putt due to NBC announcer Gary Koch initially proclaiming the putt as merely "better than most," and then repeating the phrase more excitedly as the ball wound its way towards the hole.
  • 2000 PGA Championship - Valhalla Golf Club - final round - 18th hole - putter - 6 foot putt to force playoff and later win
  • 2000 Bell Canadian Open - Glen Abbey Golf Club - final round - 18th hole - 6-iron - 218 yards from bunker over a large pond to 18 feet to win tournament
  • 2000 AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am - Pebble Beach - final round - 15th hole - wedge - holed out from 97 yards to eventually win from 7 strokes down with 7 holes to play
  • 1997 Grand Slam of Golf - Poipu Bay Golf Course - final round - 16th hole - sand wedge - blast from buried wet downhill lie through grass embankment onto green
  • 1997 Masters - Augusta National Golf Club - first round - 12th hole - 9-iron - chip in from behind green
  • 1997 Phoenix Open - TPC of Scottsdale - third round - 16th hole - 9-iron - ace from 155 yards
  • 1996 U.S. Amateur - Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club - final round - 11th hole - putter - 35 foot eagle putt while 2-down with 8 to play

Major championships

Woods' major championship victories are as follows:

With his victory in The Masters in 2001, Tiger became the only player ever to hold all four professional majors at once (although this did not occur in a calendar year, and is therefore not recognized by some as a true Grand Slam). The achievement has been nicknamed "The Tiger Slam".

Woods holds at least a share of the record for lowest 72-hole score in relation to par in all four majors, and at least a share of the low-72 holes record in two of them. The "to par" and "low 72-holes" records are not always the same because, while most championship golf course have a par of 72, or 288 for four rounds, some have a par of 71 or 70:

  • The Masters: -18 (270), 1997 (outright to-par and low 72 holes record)
  • US Open: -12 (272), 2000 (outright to par record)
  • The Open Championship: -19 (269), 2000 (outright to-par record)
  • PGA Championship: -18 (270), 2000 (to-par record shared with Bob May)

The above performances have also given him the record for victory margin in two majors:

  • The Masters: 12 strokes, 1997
  • US Open: 15 strokes, 2000 (record for all majors)

Woods is one of the few players to have finished in the Top 5 and Top 10 in All 4 Majors in a year. He has done this twice, first in 2000 and then in 2005.

Including Woods' three U.S. Amateur Championship wins, he and Bobby Jones are the only golfers to win thirteen total majors before age 30.

Results

Tournament 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006
The Masters T41 LA CUT 1 T8 T18 5 1 1 T15 T22 1 T3
U.S. Open WD T82 T19 T18 T3 1 T12 1 T20 T17 2
The Open Championship T68 T22 LA T24 3 T7 1 T25 T28 T4 T9 1
PGA Championship DNP DNP T29 T10 1 1 T29 2 T39 T24 T4

LA = Low Amateur
DNP = did not play
WD = withdrew
CUT = missed the half way cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place.
Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-10.

PGA TOUR career summary

Year Majors Other wins PGA Tour wins Earnings ($) Money list rank
1996 0 2 2 790,594 24
1997 1 3 4 2,066,833 1
1998 0 1 1 1,841,117 4
1999 1 7 8 6,616,585 1
2000 3 6 9 9,188,321 1
2001 1 4 5 6,687,777 1
2002 2 3 5 6,912,625 1
2003 0 5 5 6,673,413 2
2004 0 1 1 5,365,472 4
2005 2 4 6 10,628,024 1
2006* 0 2 2 2,485,083 2
Career* 10 38 48 58,255,844 1
* As of 21 April 2006.

Woods was only a professional for approximately one-third of the 1996 season. In addition to his PGA Tour wins, he has won a number of events on professional tours outside North America, and several professional events which were not for official money on any tour.

Woods receives the majority of his income from endorsement contracts, and is the highest-earning sportsman in the world. In June of 2005, Forbes estimated his annual income at US$87 million [8].

PGA tour wins

Major championships are shown in bold.

Other professional wins

United States national team appearances

Amateur

Professional

Charity and youth projects

Tiger Woods has established several charitable and youth projects.

  • The Tiger Woods Foundation: The Tiger Woods Foundation was established in 1996 by Tiger Woods and his father Earl. It focuses on projects for children. Initially these comprised golf clinics (aimed especially at disadvantaged children), and a grant program. Further activities added since then include university scholarships, an association with Target House at St. Jude Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee; the Start Something character development program, which had had over one million participants by 2003; and the Tiger Woods Learning Center.
  • In The City Golf Clinics and Festivals: Since 1997, the Tiger Woods Foundation has conducted junior golf clinics across the country. The Foundation began the “In the City” golf clinic program in 2003. The first three clinics were held in Indio, Calif., Wilkinsburg, Pa., and San Juan, Puerto Rico, and were targeted to all youth, ages 7-17, and their families. Each three-day event features golf lessons on Thursday and Friday of clinic week and a free community festival on Saturday. Cities are selected to participate in the clinics through a formal bid process. Winning cities may invite 15 junior golfers to participate and receive instruction from local PGA professionals. Top junior golfers from each In The City Clinic are selected to participate in the annual Tiger Woods Foundation Youth Clinic. This three-day junior golf event includes tickets to Disney Resorts; a pitch, putt and drive skills tournament; a junior golf clinic; and an exhibition by Tiger Woods. As part of the junior golf clinics, TWF works with the Make-A-Wish Foundation to bring at least one Make-A-Wish child to each clinic. These children are given the opportunity to meet Tiger, take some photos with him and talk to him about anything they choose.
  • Tiger Woods Learning Center: This is a 35,000 square foot (3,000 m²) educational facility in Anaheim, California which opened in February 2006. [9] It is expected to be used by several thousand students each year, with a day program for grades 4 to 6 and an after school program for grades 7 to 12. There will also be summer programs, weekend and community outreach programs and online learning programs. The center's website states, "Our mission is to provide an interactive enrichment program that will improve individual aptitude in reading, math, science and technology". The centre will feature extensive multi-media facilities and an outdoor golf teaching area.
  • Tiger Jam: An annual fundraising concert. 2006's Tiger Jam IX will be headlined by Sting.
  • Target World Challenge: An annual off-season charity golf tournament. The event also carries generous prize money, but Woods donates his winnings to his foundation.
  • Tiger Woods Foundation National Junior Golf Team: An eighteen member team which competes in the annual Junior World Golf Championships.

Tiger Woods has also participated in charity work for his current caddy, Steve Williams. On April 24, 2006 Tiger won an auto racing event that benefited the Steve Williams Foundation to raise funds to provide sporting careers for disadvantaged youth. [10]

Endorsements

Shortly after his 21st birthday, Woods began signing numerous endorsement deals. Some of the companies that Woods signed with include General Motors, General Mills, American Express, Accenture and the one he is most known for Nike. Woods signed a 5-year, $100 million endorsing contract with Nike, which at the time was the largest endorsing deal ever signed by an athlete. Some of the famous Nike advertising campaigns to feature Woods include the "I'm Tiger Woods" spots, where children claim they are the golfing superstar. Another well-known campaign was the one featuring the "ball trick." The popular Nike TV commercial was basically his creation. It was a routine Tiger would do at times when he was hitting balls or practicing just to goof off. Nike took the idea and turned it into an advertisement. No special effects or computer work was used—Tiger did the trick completely on his own, all in one take. His talent, looks, youth appeal, and personality have made him a bankable celebrity and the highest valued atheltic spokesperson numerous years in a row. Only Michael Jordan and Arnold Palmer have had longer tenures at the top for endorsements and have made more money from them overall than Woods.

Controversy

Early in his career Woods was at the center of a number of controversies. In 1996 a Nike television commercial starring Woods aired implying that racism still exists in the golfing community. Nike was later forced to admit that they could not identify specific courses that would not allow African-Americans to play. Also in 1996, Woods drew harsh criticism from the media (and his fellow Tour pros) when he broke protocol and withdrew from the Buick Challenge tournament in Pine Mountain, Georgia; he also failed to attend a dinner held in his honor the night before (he later apologized to those in attendance). In 1997 a GQ article portrayed Woods as using profanity and telling racist and sexist jokes.

In recent years he has become more aware of and comfortable with the scrutiny and expectations for public behavior that come with being one of the most successful and most watched figures in professional sports.

In 2006, following the US Masters, Woods referred to himself as a 'spaz' in a post-tournament interview, in reference to his putting during the tournament. While the comment brought little notice in the United States, he was criticised by many outside the US (where the word has a much more negative connotation), including Paralympian Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson. [11] His manager promptly apologised for the remark on his behalf. [12]

Tiger-Proofing

Early in Woods' career, a small number of golf experts expressed concern about his impact on the competitiveness of the game (and thus the public appeal of professional golf). This issue was most prominent from 1999-2002, when Woods was at his most dominant. Sports writer Bill Lyon of Knight-Ridder asked in a column, "Isn't Tiger Woods actually bad for golf?" (though Lyon ultimately concluded that he wasn't [13]). At first, some pundits feared that Woods would drive the spirit of competition out of the game of golf by making existing courses obsolete and relegating opponents to simply competing for second place each week. Many courses in the PGA Tour rotation (including Major Championship sites like Augusta National) even began to add yardage to their tees in an effort to slow down long hitters like Woods, a strategy that became known as "Tiger-Proofing". However, Woods was unable to maintain his pace after 2002. Also, the increases in PGA Tour television ratings and prize money since Woods arrived on the golf scene have largely discredited his detractors to the point that, as of 2005, the complaint is rarely heard. The current mainstream view is that Woods' success is one of the most positive things that has ever happened to golf.

See also

References

  • John Andrisani (1999). The Tiger Woods Way : An Analysis of Tiger Woods' Power-Swing Technique. Three Rivers Press. ISBN 0609801392 (Paperback).
  • John Feinstein (1999). The Majors : In Pursuit of Golf's Holy Grail. Little, Brown. ISBN 0316279714 (hardcover).
  • Tim Rosaforte (2000). Raising the Bar : The Championship Years of Tiger Woods. St Martins Press. ISBN 031227212X (hardcover).
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tiger Woods.

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  1. ^ "Week 24 1997 Ending 15 Jun 1997" (pdf). OWGR. Retrieved December 20, 2018.
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