Earl Woods - Biography

Last Editor: danceonsalsa				Earl Woods Biography -   Name : Earl Woods Profession : Golfer Birth Details : born December 30, 1975, in Cypress, California

Earl Woods Trivia -

N/A

Earl Woods Detailed Biography -

Eldrick T. (Tiger) Woods (born December 30, 1975, in Cypress, California) is an American golfer widely considered to be one of the greatest golfers of all time. In 2005, at the age of 29, he won his tenth major golf championship, placing him third on the all-time list behind Jack Nicklaus and Walter Hagen. He has won more times on the PGA Tour than any other active golfer. Woods, who is of mixed race, is credited with prompting a major surge of interest in the game of golf among racial minorities and young people in the United States. Woods comes from a comfortable social background. His father, Earl Woods, is a Vietnam War veteran and a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, of mixed Black, Chinese and Native American ancestry. He is now the chairman of his son's charitable foundation, the Tiger Woods Foundation (see section Charity and youth projects below). Woods' mother, Kultida Woods, is originally from Thailand, and is of mixed Thai, Chinese, and Dutch ancestry. This makes Woods himself one quarter Chinese, one quarter Thai, one-quarter Black, one eighth Native American, and one eighth Dutch. He refers to his ethnic make-up as 'Cablinasian' (a portmanteau of Caucasian, Black, American-Indian, and Asian), a term he made up himself. Woods' actual given name is 'Eldrick'. He was given the nickname 'Tiger' at birth, after a Vietnamese war comrade of his father's, and became generally known by that name. By the time he achieved national prominence in junior and amateur golf, he was simply known as "Tiger Woods". In 2004, Woods became engaged to Elin Nordegren, a Swedish model. They were introduced by Swedish golf star Jesper Parnevik, who had employed her as a nanny. They married on October 5, 2004, in a sunset ceremony at the Sandy Lane Hotel and Golf Club on Barbados, amid armed security and before approximately 200 family and friends. They currently make their primary home at Isleworth, a community in Windermere, a suburb of Orlando, Florida. They also have homes in Jackson, Wyoming, California and Sweden. On January 25, 2006, they purchased a 10-acre plot in Jupiter Island, Florida, termed one of the richest enclaves in the United States, which has waterfront on both the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian River Lagoon. Valued at $38 million (USD), it is believed to be the largest single residential real estate transaction in the history of Martin County, Florida. Woods was a child prodigy who began to play golf at age 9. While still a small child, he demonstrated his golf skills in a television appearance on the Mike Douglas Show. In 1984, he won the 9-10 boys' event at the Junior World Golf Championships; Tiger was only 10 years old at the time, but 9-10 was the youngest age group available. Overall, he won the Junior World Championships six times, including four consecutive wins from 1988-1991. Woods went on to win the U.S. Junior Amateur title in 1991, 1992, and 1993; he remains the event's youngest-ever winner, and its only multiple winner. He followed this with three consecutive U.S. Amateur titles over the next three years. With his first US Amateur win in 1994, the year that he graduated high school, he became the youngest player ever to win that event. His five USGA Championships before age 20 qualify him for consideration as having the greatest under-20 golf career of all time. He attended Stanford University and won one NCAA individual championship. In 1996, Woods decided to leave Stanford after only two years because he believed he was ready to succeed as a professional.