Tiger Woods biography, information, news, pics (pictures), links and products (Golfer)

Eldrick Tont 'Tiger' Woods (born December 30, 1975)[4][5] 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 is the highest-paid professional athlete in the world, having earned an estimated US$90.5 million from winnings and endorsements in 2010.[6][7]

Woods has won 14 professional major golf championships, the second highest of any male player (Jack Nicklaus leads with 18), and 71 PGA Tour events, third all time behind Sam Snead and Nicklaus.[8] He has more career major wins and career PGA Tour wins than any other active golfer does. He is the youngest player to achieve the career Grand Slam, and the youngest and fastest to win 50 tournaments on tour. Additionally, Woods is only the second golfer, after Jack Nicklaus, to have achieved a career Grand Slam three times. Woods has won 16 World Golf Championships, and won at least one of those events in each of the first 11 years after they began in 1999.

Woods held the number one position in the world rankings for the most consecutive weeks and for the greatest total number of weeks of any other golfer. He has been awarded PGA Player of the Year a record ten times,[9] the Byron Nelson Award for lowest adjusted scoring average a record eight times, and has the record of leading the money list in nine different seasons.

From December 2009 to early April 2010, Woods took leave from professional golf to focus on his marriage after he admitted infidelity. His multiple infidelities were revealed by several different women, through many worldwide media sources.[10]

In October 2010, Woods lost the world number one ranking; his ranking gradually fell to a low of #58 in November 2011.[7][11] He snapped a career-long winless streak of 107 weeks when he captured the Chevron World Challenge in December 2011.[11] As of February 27, 2012, he is ranked #21.[12] He remains winless on the PGA Tour since September 2009.

PGA Player of the Year 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009

Early life and amateur golf career

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.[18] In 1978, Tiger putted against comedian Bob Hope in a television appearance on The Mike Douglas Show. At age three, he shot a 48 over nine holes over the Cypress Navy course, and at age five, he appeared in Golf Digest and on ABC's That's Incredible.[19] 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.[20] In 1984 at the age of eight, he won the 9–10 boys' event, the youngest age group available, at the Junior World Golf Championships.[21] He first broke 80 at age eight.[22] He went on to win the Junior World Championships six times, including four consecutive wins from 1988 to 1991.[23][24][25][26][27]

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.[28][29] Woods first broke 70 on a regulation golf course at age 12.[30]

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.[31] 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.[32] Earl Woods had researched in detail the career accomplishments of Nicklaus, and had set his young son the goals of breaking those records.[30]

While attending Western High School in Anaheim at the age of 15, Woods became the youngest ever U.S. Junior Amateur champion (a record which stood until it was broken by Jin Liu in 2010).[33] He was named 1991's Southern California Amateur Player of the Year (for the second consecutive year) and Golf Digest Junior Amateur Player of the Year. In 1992, he defended his title at the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship, becoming the first multiple winner; competed in his first PGA Tour event, the Nissan Los Angeles Open (he missed the 36-hole cut); and was named Golf Digest Amateur Player of the Year, Golf World Player of the Year, and Golfweek National Amateur of the Year.[34][35]

The following year, Woods won his third consecutive U.S. Junior Amateur Championship; he remains the event's only three-time winner.[36] In 1994, at the TPC at Sawgrass in Florida, he became the youngest-ever winner of the U.S. Amateur Championship, a record that stood until 2008 when it was broken by Danny Lee.[37] He was a member of the American team at the 1994 Eisenhower Trophy World Amateur Golf Team Championships (winning), and the 1995 Walker Cup (losing).[38][39]

Woods graduated from Western High School in 1994 at age 18, and was voted 'Most Likely to Succeed' among the graduating class. He had starred for the high school's golf team under coach Don Crosby.[40]

Woods was recruited very heavily by college golf powers, and chose Stanford University, the 1994 NCAA Division I champion. He enrolled at Stanford in the fall of 1994 under a golf scholarship, winning his first collegiate event, the 40th Annual William H. Tucker Invitational, that September.[41] He declared a major in economics, and was nicknamed 'Urkel' by college teammate Notah Begay III.[42] In 1995, he successfully defended his U.S. Amateur title at the Newport Country Club in Rhode Island[37] and was voted Pac-10 Player of the Year, NCAA First Team All-American, and Stanford's Male Freshman of the Year (an award that encompasses all sports).[43][44] He participated in his first PGA Tour major, the 1995 Masters Tournament, and tied for 41st as the only amateur to make the cut. At age 20 in 1996, he became the first golfer to win three consecutive U.S. Amateur titles[45] and won the NCAA individual golf championship.[46] In winning the Silver Medal as leading amateur at The Open Championship, he tied the record for an amateur aggregate score of 281.[47] He left college after two years and turned professional.

Professional career

Woods became a professional golfer in August 1996, and immediately signed deals with Nike, Inc. and Titleist that ranked as the most lucrative endorsement contracts in golf history at that time.[48][49] Woods was named Sports Illustrated's 1996 Sportsman of the Year and PGA Tour Rookie of the Year.[50] In April 1997, he won his first major, the Masters, becoming the tournament's youngest-ever winner.[51] Two months later, he set the record for the fastest-ever ascent to #1 in the Official World Golf Rankings.[52] After a lackluster 1998, Woods finished the 1999 season with eight wins, including the PGA Championship, a feat not achieved since 1974.[53][54]

In 2000, Woods achieved six consecutive wins, the longest winning streak since 1948. One of these was the 2000 U.S. Open, where he broke or tied nine tournament records in what Sports Illustrated called 'the greatest performance in golf history.'[55] At age 24, he became the youngest golfer to achieve the Career Grand Slam.[56] At the end of 2000, Woods had won nine of the twenty PGA Tour events he entered and had broken the record for lowest scoring average in tour history. He was named the Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year, the first and only athlete to be honored twice, and was ranked by Golf Digest magazine as the twelfth-best golfer of all time.[57][58]

Following a stellar 2001 and 2002 in which Woods continued to dominate the tour, Woods' career hit a 'slump'.[53][59] He did not win a major in 2003 or 2004. In September 2004, Vijay Singh overtook Woods in the Official World Golf Rankings, breaking Woods' record streak of 264 weeks at #1.[60] Woods rebounded in 2005, winning six official PGA Tour money events and reclaiming the top spot in July after swapping it back and forth with Singh over the first half of the year.[61]

In 2006, Woods began dominantly, winning his first two PGA tournaments but failing to capture his fifth Masters championship in April.[62][63] Following the death of his father in May, Woods took a nine-week hiatus from the tour and appeared rusty upon his return at the U.S. Open, missing the cut at Winged Foot.[64] However, he quickly returned to form and ended the year by winning six consecutive tour events. At the season's close, with 54 wins and 12 majors wins, Woods had broken the tour records for both total wins and total majors wins over eleven seasons.[65]

He continued to excel in 2007 and the first part of 2008. In April 2008, he underwent knee surgery and missed the next two months on the tour.[66] Woods returned for the 2008 U.S. Open, where he struggled the first day but ultimately claimed a dramatic victory over Rocco Mediate, after which Mediate said, 'This guy does things that are just not normal by any stretch of the imagination,' and Kenny Perry added, 'He beat everybody on one leg.'[67][68][69] Two days later, Woods announced that he would miss the remainder of the season due to further knee surgery, and that his knee was more severely damaged than previously revealed, prompting even greater praise for his U.S. Open performance. Woods called it 'my greatest ever championship.'[70][71][72] In Woods' absence, TV ratings for the remainder of the season suffered a huge decline from 2007.[73]

Upon Woods' much-anticipated return in 2009, he performed well, including a spectacular performance at the 2009 Presidents' Cup, but failed to win a major, the first year since 2004 that he failed to do so.[74][75][76] After his marital infidelities came to light at the end of 2009 and received massive media coverage, Woods announced in December that he would be taking an indefinite break from competitive golf. In February 2010, he delivered a televised apology for his behavior. During this period, several companies ended their endorsement deals with Woods.

He returned to competition in April at the 2010 Masters Tournament, where he finished in a tie for fourth place.[77] He followed the Masters with poor showings at the Quail Hollow Championship and the Players Championship, where he withdrew in the fourth round citing injury.[78] Shortly afterward, Woods' coach since 2003, Hank Haney, resigned the position; he was replaced in August by Sean Foley. The rest of the season went badly for Woods, who failed to win a single event for the first time since turning professional, while nevertheless finishing the season ranked #2 in the world.

Woods' performance continued to suffer in 2011, taking its toll on his ranking. After falling to #7 in March, he rebounded to #5 with a strong showing at the 2011 Masters Tournament, where he tied for fourth place.[79][80][81] Due to leg injuries incurred at the Masters, he missed several summer events; in July he fired his longtime caddy Steve Williams, replacing him temporarily with friend Bryon Bell.[82][83] After returning to tournament play in August, Woods continued to falter, and his ranking gradually fell to a low of #58.[11] He rose to #50 in mid-November after a third-place win at the Emirates Australian Open, and broke his winless streak with a victory at December's Chevron World Challenge.[11][84]

His 2012 season started at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship on the European Tour in late January. For the first two days of play Tiger was grouped with Rory McIlroy and world No.1 Luke Donald. He shot under par rounds of 70 and 69 on Thursday and Friday respectively, which left him in joint 4th place at 5-under par. His low round of the week came on Saturday, shooting a 6-under par 66, giving him the joint lead with England's Robert Rock. Woods struggled on Sunday and couldn't mount a big enough charge, shooting a level par 72 and settling for joint 3rd place. Woods' second tournament of the year came at the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am in early February which he had not played since 2002. His amateur partner for the week was Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo. Woods shot solid rounds of 68-68-67 on the first three days, and began Sunday in third place, four shots behind leader Charlie Wi. However, he struggled with his putting and shot a final round 75 while his playing partner Phil Mickelson shot a 64 and won the tournament. His next tournament was the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship in Arizona. Woods battled to win his first round match against Gonzalo Fernández-Castaño, 1-up, and then played Nick Watney in the second round. On the 18th hole, Woods had to make birdie to extend the match, however his 5 foot putt missed and he was knocked out of the tournament. Woods commented that his putting was hindered technically and required some work after battling with it throughout the round.[85]

Endorsements

Woods has been called the world's most marketable athlete.[86] Shortly after his 21st birthday in 1996, he began signing endorsement deals with numerous companies, including General Motors, Titleist, General Mills, American Express, Accenture, and Nike, Inc. In 2000, he signed a 5-year, $105 million contract extension with Nike. It was the largest endorsing deal ever signed by an athlete at that time.[87] Woods' endorsement has been credited with playing a significant role in taking the Nike Golf brand from a 'start-up' golf company earlier in the past decade, to becoming the leading golf apparel company in the world, and a major player in the equipment and golf ball market.[86][88] Nike Golf is one of the fastest growing brands in the sport, with an estimated $600 million in sales.[89] Woods has been described as the 'ultimate endorser' for Nike Golf,[89] frequently seen wearing Nike gear during tournaments, and even in advertisements for other products.[87] Woods receives a cut from the sales of Nike Golf apparel, footwear, golf equipment, golf balls,[86] and has a building named after him at Nike’s headquarters campus in Beaverton, Oregon.[90]

In 2002, Woods was involved in every aspect of the launch of Buick's Rendezvous SUV. A company spokesman stated that Buick is happy with the value of Woods' endorsement, pointing out that more than 130,000 Rendezvous vehicles were sold in 2002 and 2003. 'That exceeded our forecasts,' he was quoted as saying, 'It has to be in recognition of Tiger.' In February 2004, Buick renewed Woods' endorsement contract for another five years, in a deal reportedly worth $40 million.[87]

Woods collaborated closely with TAG Heuer to develop the world's first professional golf watch, released in April 2005.[91] The lightweight, titanium-construction watch, designed to be worn while playing the game, incorporates numerous innovative design features to accommodate golf play. It is capable of absorbing up to 5,000 Gs of shock, far in excess of the forces generated by a normal golf swing.[91] In 2006, the TAG Heuer Professional Golf Watch won the prestigious iF product design award in the Leisure/Lifestyle category.[92]

Woods also endorses the Tiger Woods PGA Tour series of video games; he has done so since 1999.[93] In 2006, he signed a six-year contract with Electronic Arts, the series' publisher.[94]

In February 2007, along with Roger Federer and Thierry Henry, Woods became an ambassador for the 'Gillette Champions' marketing campaign. Gillette did not disclose financial terms, though an expert estimated the deal could total between $10 million and $20 million.[95]

In October 2007, Gatorade announced that Woods would have his own brand of sports drink starting in March 2008. 'Gatorade Tiger' was his first U.S. deal with a beverage company and his first licensing agreement. Although no figures were officially disclosed, Golfweek magazine reported that it was for five years and could pay him as much as $100 million.[96] The company decided in early fall 2009 to discontinue the drink due to weak sales.[97]

According to Golf Digest, Woods made $769,440,709 from 1996 to 2007,[98] and the magazine predicted that by 2010, Woods would pass one billion dollars in earnings.[99] In 2009, Forbes confirmed that Woods was indeed the world's first athlete to earn over a billion dollars in his career (before taxes), after accounting for the $10 million bonus Woods received for the FedEx Cup title.[100][101] The same year, Forbes estimated his net worth to be $600 million, making him the second richest 'African American' behind only Oprah Winfrey.[102]

Honors

On August 20, 2007, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver announced that Woods would be inducted into the California Hall of Fame. He was inducted December 5, 2007 at The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts in Sacramento.[103][104]

He has been named 'Athlete of the Decade' by the Associated Press in December 2009.[105] He has been named Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year a record-tying four times, and is the only person to be named Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year more than once.

Since his record-breaking win at the 1997 Masters Tournament, golf's increased popularity is commonly attributed to Woods' presence. He is credited by some sources for dramatically increasing prize money in golf, generating interest in new audiences, and for drawing the largest TV audiences in golf history.[50][106][107][108][109][110]

Tiger-proofing

Early in Woods' career, a small number of golf experts expressed concern about his impact on the competitiveness of the game and the public appeal of professional golf. Sportswriter Bill Lyon of Knight-Ridder asked in a column, 'Isn't Tiger Woods actually bad for golf?' (though Lyon ultimately concluded that he was not).[111] 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.

A related effect was measured by economist Jennifer Brown of the University of California, Berkeley who found that other golfers played worse when competing against Woods than when he was not in the tournament. The scores of highly skilled (exempt) golfers are nearly one stroke higher when playing against Woods. This effect was larger when he was on winning streaks and disappeared during his well-publicized slump in 2003–04. Brown explains the results by noting that competitors of similar skill can hope to win by increasing their level of effort, but that, when facing a 'superstar' competitor, extra exertion does not significantly raise one's level of winning while increasing risk of injury or exhaustion, leading to reduced effort.[112]

Many courses in the PGA Tour rotation (including Major Championship sites like Augusta National) 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'. Woods himself welcomed the change as he believes adding yardage to the course does not affect his ability to win.[113]

Playing style

When Woods first joined the professional tour in 1996, his long drives had a large impact on the world of golf.[114][115] 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),[116] 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.[117][118] During 2004, 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.[119][120][121]

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.[122] 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. [123]

Mike 'Fluff' Cowan served as Woods' caddy from the start of his professional career until March 1999.[124] 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.[125] In June 2011, Woods fired Williams and replaced him with Woods' friend Bryon Bell.

Equipment

As of 2011:[126][127]

· Driver: Nike VR Tour Driver (8.5 degrees; Mitsubishi Diamana Whiteboard 83g shaft)

· Fairway Woods: Nike VR Pro 15° 3-wood with Mitsubishi Diamana Blueboard and Nike SQ II 19° 5-Wood

· Irons: Nike VR Pro Blades (2-PW) (Tiger will put his 5 Wood or 2 Iron in the bag depending upon the course setup and conditions). All irons are 1 degree upright, have D4 swingweight, standard size Tour Velvet grips and True Temper Dynamic Gold X-100 shafts.[127]

· Putter: Nike Method 001, 35 inches long;[126][127] Titleist Scotty Cameron; Nike Method 003 (switches putters depending on the greens of certain courses)

· Driver club cover: Frank, a plush tiger head club cover created by his mother. Frank has appeared in several commercials.[128]

Career achievements

Woods has won 71 official PGA Tour events including 14 majors. He is 14–1 when going into the final round of a major with at least a share of the lead. He has been heralded as 'the greatest closer in history' by multiple golf experts.[129][130][131] He owns the lowest career scoring average and the most career earnings of any player in PGA Tour history.

He has spent the most consecutive and cumulative weeks atop the world rankings. He is one of five players (along with Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, and Jack Nicklaus) to have won all four professional major championships in his career, known as the Career Grand Slam, and was the youngest to do so.[132] Woods is the only player to have won all four professional major championships in a row, accomplishing the feat in the 2000–2001 seasons.

Major championships

Wins (14)

1 Defeated May in three-hole playoff by 1 stroke: Woods (3–4–5=12), May (4–4–5=13)

3 Defeated Mediate with a par on 1st sudden death hole after 18-hole playoff was tied at even par

Results timeline

World Golf Championships

Wins (16)

Results timeline

Tournament

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

Accenture Match Play Championship

DNP

R64

R32

R16

R32

DNP

R64

R32

Cadillac Championship

NT¹

DNP

T10

Bridgestone Invitational

DNP

T78

T37

HSBC Champions

–

DNP

PGA Tour career summary

Year	Wins (Majors)	Earnings ($)	Money list rank
1996	2	790,594	24
1997	4 (1)	2,066,833	1
1998	1	1,841,117	4
1999	8 (1)	6,616,585	1
2000	9 (3)	9,188,321	1
2001	5 (1)	6,687,777	1
2002	5 (2)	6,912,625	1
2003	5	6,673,413	2
2004	1	5,365,472	4
2005	6 (2)	10,628,024	1
2006	8 (2)	9,941,563	1
2007	7 (1)	10,867,052	1
2008	4 (1)	5,775,000	2
2009	6	10,508,163	1
2010	0	1,294,765	68
2011	0	660,238	128
2012*	0	197,400	73
Career*	71 (14)	95,014,942	1

Other ventures

Tiger Woods Foundation

The Tiger Woods Foundation was established in 1996 by Woods and his father Earl, with the primary goal of promoting golf among inner-city children.[133][134] The foundation has conducted junior golf clinics across the country, and sponsors the Tiger Woods Foundation National Junior Golf Team in the Junior World Golf Championships.[135][136] As of December 2010, TWF employed approximately 55 people.[137][138]

The foundation operates the Tiger Woods Learning Center, a $50 million, 35,000-square-foot facility in Anaheim, California, providing college-access programs for underserved youth.[135][137][139] The TWLC opened in 2006 and features seven classrooms, extensive multi-media facilities and an outdoor golf teaching area.[135] The center has since expanded to four additional campuses: two in Washington, DC; one in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and one in Stuart, Florida.[139]

The foundation benefits from the annual Chevron World Challenge and AT&T National golf tournaments hosted by Woods.[137] In October 2011, the foundation hosted the first Tiger Woods Invitational at Pebble Beach.[140] Other annual fundraisers have included the concert events Block Party, last held in 2009 in Anaheim, and Tiger Jam, last held in 2011 in Las Vegas after a one-year hiatus.[137][141][142][143]

Tiger Woods Design

In November 2006, Woods announced his intention to begin designing golf courses around the world through a new company, Tiger Woods Design.[144] A month later, he announced that the company's first course would be in Dubai as part of a 25.3 million-square-foot development, The Tiger Woods Dubai.[145] The Al Ruwaya Golf Course was initially expected to finish construction in 2009.[145] As of February 2010, only seven holes had been completed; in April 2011, the New York Times reported that the project had been shelved permanently.[146][147]

Tiger Woods Design has taken on two other courses, neither of which has materialized. In August 2007, Woods announced The Cliffs at High Carolina, a private course in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Asheville, North Carolina.[148] After a groundbreaking in November 2008, the project suffered cash flow problems and suspended construction.[147] A third course, in Punta Brava, Mexico, was announced in October 2008, but incurred delays due to issues with permits and an environmental impact study.[149][147] Construction on the Punta Brava course has not yet begun.[147]

The problems encountered by these projects have been credited to factors including overly optimistic estimates of their value; declines throughout the global economy, particularly the U.S. crash in home prices; and decreased appeal of Woods following his 2009 infidelity scandal.[147]

Writings

Woods wrote a golf instruction column for Golf Digest magazine from 1997 to February 2011.[150] In 2001 he wrote a best-selling golf instruction book, How I Play Golf, which had the largest print run of any golf book for its first edition, 1.5 million copies.[151]

Personal life

Marriage and children

In November 2003, Woods became engaged to Elin Nordegren, a Swedish former model and daughter of former minister of migration Barbro Holmberg and radio journalist Thomas Nordegren.[152] They were introduced during The Open Championship in 2001 by Swedish golfer Jesper Parnevik, who had employed her as an au pair. They married on October 5, 2004, at the Sandy Lane resort in Barbados, and lived at Isleworth, a community in Windermere, a suburb of Orlando, Florida.[153][154] In 2006, they purchased a $39 million estate in Jupiter Island, Florida, and began constructing a 10,000-square-foot home; Woods moved there in 2010 following the couple's divorce.[154][155]

Woods and Nordegren's first child, a daughter named Sam Alexis Woods, was born on June 18, 2007. Woods chose the name because his own father had always called him Sam.[156] Their son, Charlie Axel Woods, was born on February 8, 2009.[157]

Infidelity scandal and fallout

On November 25, 2009, supermarket tabloid The National Enquirer published a story claiming that Woods had an extramarital affair with New York City nightclub manager Rachel Uchitel, a claim she denied.[158] Two days later, around 2:30 AM on November 27, Woods left home in his Cadillac Escalade SUV and, while still on his street, collided with a fire hydrant, a tree, and several hedges.[159] He was treated for minor facial lacerations and received a ticket for careless driving.[159][160] Following intense media speculation about the accident, Woods released a statement on his website taking sole responsibility for the accident, calling it a 'private matter' and crediting his wife for helping him from the car.[161][162] On November 30, Woods announced that he would not be appearing at his own charity golf tournament, the Chevron World Challenge, nor any other tournaments in 2009, due to his injuries.[163]

On December 2, following the release by US Weekly of a voicemail message allegedly left by Tiger for a mistress, Woods released another statement in which he admitted 'transgressions' and apologized to 'all of those who have supported [him] over the years', while reiterating his and his family's right to privacy.[158][164] Over the next several days, more than a dozen women claimed in various media outlets to have had affairs with Woods.[10] On December 11, he released a third statement admitting to infidelity and apologizing again, as well as announcing that he would be taking 'an indefinite break from professional golf.'[10]

In the days and months following Woods' admission of infidelity, several companies re-evaluated their relationships with him. Accenture, AT&T, Gatorade and General Motors completely ended their sponsorship deals, while Gillette suspended advertising featuring Woods.[165][166][167] TAG Heuer dropped Woods from advertising in December 2009 and officially ended their deal when his contract expired in August 2011.[165][168] The magazine Golf Digest suspended Woods' monthly column beginning with the February 2010 issue.[169] In contrast, Nike continued to support Woods, as did Electronic Arts, which was working with Woods on the game Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online.[170] A December 2009 study estimated the shareholder loss caused by Woods' affairs to be between $5 billion and $12 billion.[171][172]

On February 19, 2010, Woods gave a televised statement in which he said he had been in a 45-day therapy program since the end of December. He again apologized for his actions. 'I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to,' he said. 'I felt that I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled. Thanks to money and fame, I didn't have to go far to find them. I was wrong. I was foolish.' He said he did not know yet when he would be returning to golf.[173][174] He announced a few weeks later on March 16 that he would be returning at the 2010 Masters Tournament on April 8.[175]

Other

From childhood Woods was raised as a Buddhist, and actively practised this faith from childhood until well into his adult professional golf career.[177] In a 2000 article, Woods was quoted as saying he 'believes in Buddhism... Not every aspect, but most of it.'[178] He has attributed his deviations and infidelity to his losing track of Buddhism. He said that 'Buddhism teaches me to stop following every impulse and to learn restraint. Obviously I lost track of what I was taught.'[179]

Tiger Woods is registered as an independent.[180] In January 2009, Woods delivered a speech commemorating the military at the We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial.[181][182] In April 2009, Woods visited the White House while in the Washington, D.C. area promoting the golf tournament he hosts, the AT&T National.[183]

Woods underwent laser eye surgery in 1999. Before this surgery, Woods eyesight was minus 11, meaning he was almost legally blind. He considered the surgery a big help in his career and a good alternative to the glasses and contact lenses.[184] He immediately started winning tour events after the surgery. He received money from TLC Laser Eye Centers to endorse them.[185] In 2007, he had a second laser eye surgery when his vision began to deteriorate again.[186]

TIGER WOODS

FAN PAGE