Table of Contents
FOR MY WIFE, EMMA, WITH LOVE
PROLOGUE
I FIRST MET TIGER WOODS on October 6, 2002. It was a sunny Sunday morning at his home course of Isleworth, Florida, and Tiger was playing best-ball scramble with four average Joes who had won a sweepstakes with Upper Deck sports cards. I was invited to ride along with Tiger for the first nine holes and ask him a few questions. Nothing too personal, his agent had warned me. Questions about his new girlfriend, Elin Nordegren, would get me tossed off the property within seconds.
I had met his father, Earl, the previous June during the Tiger Woods Junior Golf Clinic at Walt Disney World. He had talked for nearly an hour, repeating amusing, candid, and downright embarrassing anecdotes from Tigers youth. Earl was a master of oversharing, and Tiger had learned to smile in an aw-shucks way at his fathers long-winded stories. If Tiger was annoyed by his fathers bravado, he didnt show it.
Earl may have been an interviewers dream, but Tiger had a reputation of being a Cheshire cat, known to grin and disappear when asked questions he didnt want to answer. Tigers team members made clear to me that he could end the interview at any time, and they recommended that I not ask anything offensive.
I met Tiger on the golf course, and he gave me a polite, yet firm handshake as we climbed into his cart. It was a shallow conversation, the equivalent of elevator small talk. We chatted about baseball cards, hip-hop artists, and sports drinks. We shared workout tips. I admired his pimped-out golf cart, complete with neon running lights and a six-speaker sound system. What I learned about Tiger that day: He loved Caddyshack but hated Caddyshack II. He was self-conscious about his skinny calves. He liked to ski. He loved pink lemonade. He sweated a lot while golfing in the oppressive Florida heat and humidity, so he had a half-dozen extra shirts in his golf cart.
We didnt talk much about golf that day; his one-stroke loss at the 2002 PGA Tournament was still painfully fresh in his mind, and he was teetering on the edge of a slump that would last nearly three years. Still, Tiger was engaging, relaxed, and occasionally funny as we developed a rapport that made him an easy interview. I liked him immediately.
On April 16, 2004, I met Tiger again, this time at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Tiger had spent the previous week running obstacle courses, shooting rifles, and polishing boots with the Green Berets. Earl Woods had been assigned to a Special Forces unit at Fort Bragg in 1967, and Tiger wanted to take a training tour to honor his father.
The military week had made Tiger a little more introspective than he had been at our last meeting; wearing his camouflage uniform with his name above the left pocket, Tiger was willing to open up a little bit more. Ive always taken the creed that you can be young once, but immature forever, he said. I think Im growing up now.
Tiger was in midslump by thenhe had finished twenty-second in the 2004 Masters five days earlierand he was in a reflective mood, like a teenager leaving summer camp for the cold reality of the next school year. He looked longingly at the waiting Humvee and sighed. If I werent a golfer, he said, I would have trained for Special Ops.
I was on hand for his October 5, 2004, wedding. Wearing a tan suit and white shirt, a serene Tiger stood on a Barbados hillside and pledged to spend his life with Elin Nordegren for better or worse, richer or poorer, in sickness and in health. As Tigers face was illuminated by a spectacular fireworks display at the reception, the optimism in his eyes was unmistakable. Whatever would happen later, he seemed to believe on that picturesque evening that this was a permanent union, and he was ready to share his amazing life with his stunning new wife.
The next time I sat down with him was on January 26, 2005. Married for less than four months, the newlywed Tiger exuded an optimistic glow as we chatted about his marriage, his dreams for the future, and his desire for children. His professional resurgence had just begun, including a win at the Buick Invitational just three days earlier. He had regained his confidence on the course and would go on to win the Masters that year. It was the most candid Tiger would ever be with me, and he talked openly about his new bride. I knew that Elin was a special woman pretty soon after I met her, he enthused with pride. I knew that she was the one for me. Shes a special person, and I know how lucky I am to have her. Were at the beginning of our life together, and thats an exciting place to be.
The excitement of Elin was still new, and Tiger beamed as he talked about her. It wasnt a grin or a sly smile; it was a wide-eyed, open-mouthed exuberance that can come only from personal fulfillment and happiness. I married Elin because I see a long future with her, he boldly declared.
I spent several hours with Tiger that day, watching him put on a reflective suit to do a motion capture session for his video game Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2006. He had famously modified his swing, and he wanted to update the video game to reflect his real-life changes. He was in a good mood, and the conversation flowed easily. I had recently covered the divorce of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston, and Tiger was surprisingly interested in knowing the details. He wondered aloud if Angelina Jolie was really the other woman. He asked me about Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise. It was a human conversation that was shockingly commonplace; it was surprising that Tiger Woodsone of the worlds biggest and most private starscared about the lives of other celebrities whom he had never met.
But that was the paradox of Tiger Woods. The more I talked to him, the less I knew about him. Every answer he gave would raise ten more queries, but his limited time made it impossible for me to ask enough follow-up questions.
The last time I spoke to Tiger, on June 25, 2009, the care-free exuberance had been replaced by a weary worldliness. He had spent a frenetic morning promoting his video game in Times Square, but he was more than physically drained; he seemed emotionally fatigued. As I sat down with him, the conversation drifted to his father, who had died three years earlier. My dad passed away before Sam [Tigers daughter] was born, he said evenly, so I didnt have a chance to talk to him about being a father. I regret that. I will always regret that.
Fathers Day had just passed; it was the first one since the birth of his son, Charlie Axel. Tiger didnt celebrate with his family; he was busy playing in the U.S. Open. But he acknowledged that his memories of Earl Woods made it a hard day for him. I think of him every day, he told me. He taught me everything. I hear his voice.
Tiger got a faraway look in his eye as he told me the oft-repeated story of his father teaching him to play golf: the white high chair in the garage, Earl practicing his swing, Tigers fascination with the sport. The coaching, the mind games, the training. It was almost as if Tiger believed that talking about Earls influence would keep him alive, at least for the moment.
Over the years, I had heard rumors of Tigers partyingdrunken nights at the clubs, dirty dancing with other women, phone numbers slipped to pretty blondesbut I didnt follow up on the tips. For one thing, the stories were nearly impossible to verify, and the sources were usually questionable characters: strip club bouncers, self-promoting club owners, and tabloid reporters. But my unwillingness to follow up on the tips was also self-preservation. Negative coverage of Tigeror even positive coverage that wasnt approved and micromanagedwould often result in swift, permanent excommunication from the Tiger Woods camp. It was in everyones best interest to sweep the rumors under the rug.
