Belmont and Belcourt Biographies - Tiger Woods: An Unauthorized Biography

T IGER W OODS

An Unauthorized Biography

Copyright 2013 by Belmont & Belcourt Biographies

All rights reserved. Neither this book nor any parts within it may be sold or reproduced in any form without permission.

eISBN: 9781619843370

"There isn't a flaw in his golf or his makeup. He will win more majors than Arnold Palmer and me combined. Somebody is going to dust my records. It might as well be Tiger, because he's such a great kid. He has the finest, fundamentally sound golf swing I've ever seen.

- Jack Nicklaus

Eldrick Tont "Tiger" Woods is an American professional golfer whose achievements to date rank him among the most successful golfers of all time. Formerly the World no. 1, he was the highest-paid athlete in the world according to Forbes, for several years.

This was followed by a loss of form, and his ranking gradually fell to a low of No. 58 in November, 2011.

Before his highly publicized fall from grace in 2010, Woods, the California child prodigy and richest athlete of all time, was on his way to golf legend status, with 14 major championships to his name, just four shy of all-time great Jack Nicklaus.

In 2010, Woods who publicly apologized to wife Elin Nordegren and their two children, daughter Sam and son Charlie returned to the green, with his lucrative Nike contract intact, but the state of his marriage "irretrievably broken. After months of speculation, the couple finalized their divorce, issuing a joint statement saying, "We are sad that our marriage is over and we wish each other the very best for the future."

At age 37, the story of Tiger Woods is one to behold.

"One thing that makes Tiger Tiger is that he's more willing to bring a shot from the practice tee onto the course than any golfer I know.

- Butch Harmon

When Woods first joined the professional tour in 1996, his long drives had a large impact on the world of golf. However, when he did not upgrade his equipment 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. Phil Mickelson even made a joke in 2003 about Woods using "inferior equipment", which did not sit well with Nike, Titleist or Woods. During the 2004 season, Woods finally upgraded his driver technology to a larger clubhead and graphite shaft, which, coupled with his clubhead speed, made him one of the Tour's lengthier players off the tee once again.

Despite his power 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, his iron play is generally accurate, his recovery and bunker play is very strong, 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.

From mid-1993, while he was still an amateur, until 2004, Woods worked almost exclusively with leading swing coach Butch Harmon. From mid-1997, Harmon and Woods fashioned a major redevelopment of Woods' full swing, achieving greater consistency, better distance control, and better kinesiology. The changes began to pay off in 1999. From March 2004 to 2010, Woods was coached by Hank Haney, who worked on flattening his swing plane. Woods continued to win tournaments with Haney, but his driving accuracy dropped significantly. Haney resigned in May 2010 and was replaced by Sean Foley.

Mike Fluff Cowan served as Woods' caddy from the start of his professional career until March 1999. He was replaced by Steve Williams, who became a close friend of Woods and is often credited with helping him with key shots and putts. In June 2011, Woods fired Williams and replaced him with Woods' friend Bryon Bell on an interim basis. Joe LaCava, a former caddy of both Fred Couples and Dustin Johnson, was hired by Woods shortly after.

When Tiger was 6 months old, he would sit in our garage, watching me hit balls into a net. He had been assimilating his golf swing. When he got out of the high chair, he had a golf swing.

- Earl Woods

Tiger Woods was born in Cypress, California, to Earl (19322006) and Kultida (Tida) Woods (born 1944). He is the only child of their marriage, but does have two half-brothers, Earl Jr. (born 1955) and Kevin (born 1957), and a half-sister, Royce (born 1958) from the 18-year marriage of Earl Woods and his first wife, Barbara Woods Gray. Earl, a retired lieutenant colonel and Vietnam War veteran, was of African American, Native American, and possibly Chinese ancestry. Kultida (ne Punsawad), originally from Thailand (where Earl had met her on a tour of duty in 1968), is of mixed Thai, Chinese and Dutch ancestry. Tiger refers to his ethnic make-up as "Cablinasian" (an abbreviation he coined from Caucasian, Black, Native American, and Asian).

Woods' first name, Eldrick, was coined by his mother because it began with "E" (for Earl) and ended with "K" (for Kultida). His middle name Tont is a traditional Thai name. He was nicknamed Tiger in honor of his father's friend Col. Vuong Dang Phong, who had also been known as Tiger.

"I realized for the first time that he was like Michael Jordan, that he wanted the ball with the game on the line, no matter the outcome. Very few players in the history of golf have felt that way, have wanted the pressure.

- Peter Kessler , host for The Golf Channel

Woods grew up in Orange County, California. He was a child prodigy, introduced to golf before the age of two, by his athletic father Earl, a single-figure handicap amateur golfer who had been one of the earliest African-American college baseball players at Kansas State University. In 1978, Tiger putted against comedian Bob Hope in a television appearance on The Mike Douglass Show . At age three, he shot a 48 over nine holes over the Cypress Navy course, and at age five, he appeared in Gold Digest and on ABC's That's Incredible.

Before turning seven, Tiger won the Under Age 10 section of the Drive, Pitch, and Putt competition, held at the Navy Golf Course in Cypress, California. In 1984 at the age of eight, he won the 910 boys' event, the youngest age group available, at the Junior World Gold Championships. He first broke 80 at age eight. He went on to win the Junior World Championships six times, including four consecutive wins from 1988 to 1991.

Woods' father Earl wrote that Tiger first beat him when he was 11 years old, with Earl trying his best. Earl lost to Tiger every time from then on. Woods first broke 70 on a regulation golf course at age 12.

Woods' first major national junior tournament was the 1989 Big I, when he was 13 years old. Woods was paired with pro John Daly, then relatively unknown, in the final round. The event's format placed a professional with each group of juniors who had qualified. Daly birdied three of the last four holes to beat Woods by only one stroke.

As a young teenager, Woods first met Jack Nicklaus in Los Angeles at the Bel-Air Country Club, when Nicklaus was performing a clinic for the club's members. Woods was part of the show, and impressed Nicklaus and the crowd with his skills and potential. Earl Woods had researched in detail the career accomplishments of Nicklaus, and had set his young son the goals of breaking those records.