Personal Information  

 
Birth:                  December 30, 1975
Nationality:         USA
Residence:          Orlando, Florida
College:              Stanford University
Height:               6'2"
Weight:              180 pounds
Turned Pro:        1996

Tiger Woods Biography

Tiger Woods was actually named "Eldrick" Woods at birth. He was soon nicknamed "Tiger" after a man called Vuong Dang Phong, a Vietnamese war comrade of his father's. By the time he began to attain prominence in the golfing world as an amateur, starting 12 years later, he was known only as Tiger Woods and this name has stayed with him since.

His father, Earl Woods was a Vietnam War veteran of mixed Black, Chinese and Native American ancestry. His mother, Kultida Woods is originally from Thailand, and is of mixed Thai, Chinese and Dutch ancestry. Consequently, Tiger made up his own term to capture his ethnic make-up - Cablinasian - a portmanteau of Caucasian, Black, American-Indian and Asian heritage.

Woods has two half-brothers, Earl Jr (born 1955), Kevin (born 1957), and one half-sister Royce (born 1958). He got married on the 5th October 2004 to Elin Nordegren, a Swedish model who he had met and become engaged to earlier that year. Their primary residence is now in Orlando, Florida.

Having picked up a club aged three it would only be 5 more years before he would win his first significant event at the Junior World Golf Championships where he won the 9-10 boys' event...he was only 8 and was competing in the lowest age category that existed. Between this event in 1984 and 1996 when Woods' would turn professional he had an outstanding series of successes as an amateur golfer. These included winning the Junior World Championships 6 times, 4 times in a row between 1988 and 1991. He became (and remains) the youngest ever winner of the U.S. Junior Amateur Title in 1991, 1992 and 1993 and then became the only person to win three consecutive U.S. Amateur titles over the next three years. He then attended Stanford University and won one NCAA individual championship before deciding to drop out in 1996 (after two years) to turn pro.

Tigers' first step onto the professional golfing stage was a strong one which heralded signs of the future that was just around the corner. Turning pro in 1996, he won two events and his prodigious driving had captured the imagination of the golfing public. To complete a successful first season as a professional he was named 1996's "Sportsman of the Year" by Sports Illustrated. In the April of the following year Woods went on to win The Masters by a record margin of 12 strokes, sealing his fate as a golfing great and lighting the path for his future as a professional golfer.

In this short time, Woods' had taken the golfing world by storm and speculation abounded that everyone would be playing second to Tiger from now on. This fairytale was not to be as Tigers' form dipped towards the latter end of 1997. His decline in form was confimed in 1998 as he went on to win only one PGA Tour Event.

However, self-declared as the toughest mental mind in golf, in 1999 he was to begin to turn the table around. This change in form would result in the greatest period of dominance in the history of men's golf. Between 1999 and 2004 he would win 32 PGA Tour Events and maintained the number one spot at the Official World Golf Rankings for an astounding 264 consecutive weeks from the end of 1999 into 2000 - another record. This was capped by a second Sports Illustrated "Sportsman of the Year" Award and two "World Sportsman of the Year" Awards at the Laureus World Sports Awards in 2000 and 2001.

During this initial period of dominance Tiger won seven out of the eleven major championships with record breaking scores of -15 and -19 in the 2000 British Open at St Andrews. He nearly didn't make three Masters in a row as he fought to beat upstart Bob May but the following year he confirmed his dominance with the "Tiger Slam" - the first and only time that anyone has won four consecutive majors.

This period of dominance didn't last into 2003 and 2004 as he fell to second and then forth in the PGA money list and failed to win any majors. Speculation arose as to the cause of this slump and the future of Tigers' professional game. However, his critics were to be brushed aside just one year later as he returned to his winning ways following modifications to his swing aimed at reducing the stress on his over-worked left knee. His success in the 2005 PGA Tour Season was followed by a tie-breaking playoff to win the 2005 masters.

Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh were now locked in a duel, jostling for the number one world rankings spot that Singh had taken from Tiger back in September 2004. By the end of July Woods' had regained his advantage and once again began to establish his place at the top of the game. A position which he went on to confirm in 2005 as he won his 10th major at The British Open Championship plus two wins at The World Golf Championships.

The full details of Woods illustrious career can be found in the achievements section and what makes it all the more astounding is that he has achieved all of this before the age of 30. There's definitely more to come from Tiger but even now many consider him to be deserving of the honor of the greatest golfer of all time.