00:00Tiger Woods is one of the greatest golfers the game has ever produced.
00:03He has transcended the sport since he turned pro in 1996 and is probably the most recognisable face
00:09for non-golf fans. Despite this, we think there's lots of interesting facts that you may not know
00:14about Tiger Woods. So let's get stuck in. His full name is Eldrick Thont Woods. Eldrick because it
00:21has his father's initial at the start and his mother's initial at the end and Thont is a
00:26traditional Thai name. His father was in the army and named his son Tiger because his fellow soldier
00:31and friend Colonel Vuong Dang Fong was also known as Tiger. Sticking with his family and heritage,
00:37Tiger's mum, Cotilda, is Thai while his father Earl was African-American. Tiger's interest in the game
00:43began when watching his father hit golf balls in the garage. Tiger was just six months old when he
00:48would sit in his high chair and routinely watch Earl hit golf balls. Tiger made his first tv appearance
00:54on the Mike Douglas show just before his third birthday. Tiger attended Stanford University
00:59on a golf scholarship. However, he never graduated from college as he dropped out to pursue his
01:04professional career. Other famous graduates from Stanford include Tom Watson and Nota Begay.
01:09Did you know that Tiger had a stutter as a child? To overcome this, he took speech classes at school
01:14and he also spoke to his dog at night to practice confidence speech. Tiger Woods broke 80 for the first
01:19time at the age of just eight and at the age of 12 he broke 70 for the first time.
01:24Tiger Woods is a
01:25Buddhist. He told Sports Illustrated in 1996 that, I believe in Buddhism not every aspect but most of it
01:32so I've taken bits and pieces. I don't believe that human beings can achieve ultimate enlightenment
01:37because humans have flaws. Tiger became the first billion dollar athlete. He cracked the one
01:42billion dollar career earnings mark way back in 2009. Going some way to help him win this money
01:47are his 109 professional wins and 15 major championships. His sponsorship deal with Nike
01:53is also one of the most lucrative deals in the world of sport. Speaking of wins on tour,
01:57Tiger is tied third all time for victories on the European tour. This seems like an obvious fact
02:02but it becomes more interesting when you find out that Tiger has never played a full season on the
02:06European tour. Tiger has broken countless records in his career. Probably the most striking is the fact
02:11that he's spent 683 weeks at number one in the official world golf rankings. To put some context
02:18to that, this is more than double than Greg Norman who has spent the second longest amount of time as
02:22men's world number one. Tiger won the US amateur and NCAA championship titles both in 1996. Only five
02:29men have ever achieved that feat. They are Bryson DeChambeau, Phil Mickelson, Ryan Moore and Jack Nicklaus.
02:36So there you have it, some facts on the greatest golfer of all time that is Tiger Woods. I hope
02:41there
02:42were some there that you didn't know and you learned a lot about the greatest golfer of all time. For
02:46more
02:47facts and statistics on some of your favourite golfers, head to the tour section on the Golf Monthly website.
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