Tiger Woods
Eldrick Woods, better known as Tiger Woods, was born on December 30, 1975 in Cypress, California.
He took the nickname "Tiger" after a friend of his father's in Vietnam.
Tiger Woods at a young age has broken an incredible number of golfing records.
Woods is the only player to have won both the U.S. Junior Amateur and Amateur titles. In fact, he won the U.S. Junior Amateur Championships in 1991, 1992, and 1993, and the U.S. Amateur title in 1994, 1995, and 1996
Tiger Woods played in his first professional tournament in 1992, at 16; and turned pro in 1996.
In 1997, Tiger Woods became the youngest player to win the Masters and the youngest-ever No. 1 golfer when he was 21 years old.
He continued to win consistently and in July 2000, Tiger Woods won the British Open, becoming the youngest player ever to win all four major titles: the PGA Championship, the Masters, the U.S. Open, and the British Open.
2004 saw a relative downturn in his fortunes and pundits started to question Woods's decision to stop working with swing coach Butch Harmon. It was with Harmon that Tiger Woods had won his eight majors.
In the 2004 Ryder Cup, there was general amazement when Tiger Woods was paired with Phil Mickelson. In his book, "In Search of Tiger", Tom Callahan states:
"When Mickelson took a paternity break at the end of 2001 and the beginning of 2002 somebody asked, 'What's he been doing for the last five months?' Tiger answered: 'Breast feeding.'"
In 2004, Tiger married 24 year old, Elin Nordegren. They first met at the British Open when Elin was nannying for Swedish golfer Jesper Parnevik in 2001.
Tiger Woods has earned multi-millions of dollars from prize money and sponsorship, but he has also spent a significant sum on the Tiger Woods Learning Center in Anaheim, California.
The Tiger Woods Learning Centre has audio of Tiger Woods talking about his life.
When Tiger's father Earl Woods died in May 2006, Tiger acknowledged his central role:
"My dad was my best friend and greatest role model, and I will miss him deeply. I wouldn't be where I am today without him."
In June 2006, Tiger Woods played in the first tournament since his father's death - the US Open - and missed the cut in a major for the first time in his professional career.
However, almost immediately Tiger was back on the winning trail winning the Open at Hoylake in July 2006. It was his third Open title and his 11th career major, to tie with Walter Hagen with the second highest number of major wins. Although the figure is seven behind Jack Nicklaus's haul of 18, Tiger Woods reached 11 two years younger than Nicklaus.
He followed up by winning the Buick Open, thereby, at 30, becoming the youngest player to reach 50 PGA Tour wins.
Tiger Woods continued to notch up major victories and in August 2007 he won his 13th major with victory in the USPGA.
Tiger Woods lists his hobbies as diving, spear fishing and physical fitness. His favourite music is Van Halen, U2 and Prince; and Tiger's role models are Earl Woods, Kultida Woods, Michael Jordan, Charlie Sifford, and the late Bill Lazier, who lectured in the business department at Tiger's college.
In February 2008, Tiger Woods won his third WGC Match Play Championship title with a record 8&7 win over Stewart Cink.
It was Tiger's sixth straight tournament success. He then followed up by winning the Arnold Palmer Invitational.