Chapter 55

Isleworth Golf & Country Club

Windermere, Florida

March 2004

Ever since Elin came into my life,” Tiger writes on his website, “things just became a lot better. Someone you can bounce things off, somebody who is a great friend. We do just about everything together,” he says of his new fiancée. “She’s so much like me. She’s very competitive, very feisty, just like I am.”

Some people feel that Tiger needs to lean in to that competitive spirit a little more.

Aboard “Tiger Woods Airlines,” Tiger’s leased Gulfstream, Mark O’Meara is making his case. “Tiger,” he says, “you’ve got to get someone to help you with your game.”

They’re returning to Florida from Dubai, where O’Meara’s just won the European Tour’s Dubai Desert Classic, besting Tiger by five strokes.

“OK, who should I get?”

Tiger has been without a coach since August of 2002, when he and Butch Harmon parted ways following the PGA Championship.

A dubious anniversary is fast approaching. This June will mark two years since Tiger’s won a major. It’s time to stop drifting and take action.

Back when Tiger won the 1996 NCAA individual championship, Golf Digest polled top coaches about the then Stanford sophomore’s chances as a prospective new pro. Hank Haney boldly—and correctly—predicted that in Tiger’s first full year on tour, he’d top the PGA money list.

Haney, who coached the Southern Methodist University men’s golf team and established three golf schools in Dallas before taking on O’Meara as a client, never expected Tiger to notice his comment. But he soon learns that Tiger has a way of drawing on key pieces of information when he’s pressed to make a decision.

During a 1999 practice round at Isleworth, Haney had been coaching O’Meara but also noted an overly upright position in Tiger’s backswing. When Tiger made the adjustment Haney suggested, he won the PGA Championship—and five of the next six majors.

Cruising in the Gulfstream, O’Meara says, “Tiger, I know Hank’s my friend and I’ve been with him for years, but he’s the best teacher in the world.”

“Yeah, I know,” Tiger tells O’Meara. “I’m going to call him tomorrow.”

By 6:00 a.m. on Monday, March 15, Haney’s on a flight from Dallas to Orlando, then driving through the gates of Isleworth to Tiger’s house. This is going to be a challenge, Haney tells himself. This guy is different, and that’s part of why he’s great. This is going to be an incredible learning experience. It’s impossible to forget that the sixty-eighth Masters tournament begins in less than a month.

Tiger and Haney ride a custom golf cart—with “TW” spinner wheels and a top speed of twenty-eight miles per hour—to the least populated area of the Isleworth range as Tiger spells out his goals. “I want to get more consistent in every phase, so I have the kind of game that at majors will always get me on the back nine on Sundays with a chance,” he says. “I don’t want to just have a chance on the weeks when I’m hot. I want to have a chance all the time. Always putting yourself in the mix, that’s the only way you’re going to win a lot of them.”

Haney enjoys spending time with Tiger and Elin during his visits to Isleworth. The engaged couple shares a competitive streak and is evenly matched in Ping-Pong, tennis, and running. Elin delights in every point or match she wins, laughing and shouting, “I’m going to take you down!”

Tiger levels with Sports Illustrated in the lead-up to the 2004 Masters that he’s having trouble trusting his self-directed swing changes, which have left him with diminished power and precision. “You can hit things on the range,” he says, “but when you’ve got water left, water right, bunkers, the wind is blowing, you’ve got to hit the ball into a tight spot, yeah, it makes it a little more stressful.”

Phil Mickelson has spent the first months of 2004 working with a swing coach and training with a strength and conditioning coach while skipping his favorite carbs, such as doughnuts and the buns on his In-N-Out burgers.

At the end of the third round, Mickelson and Chris DiMarco share the Masters lead at 6 under, while Tiger is 3 over and tied for twentieth place. Asked about his position on the leaderboard, Mickelson is quick to answer, “Well, it doesn’t suck,” his brash honesty dissolving the press corps into fits of laughter.

Jokes aside, Mickelson takes his enduring competition with Tiger—and the specter of Tiger’s three Green Jackets—very seriously. In nearly twelve years as a professional golfer, the thirty-three-year-old married father of three has become known as “the best player to never win a major.”

On Sunday, April 11, he’s neck and neck with Ernie Els. Mickelson mounts a charge and on his last hole ekes out his first Masters win. Mickelson raises his arms, leaps into the air, and shouts, “I did it!”

After he finished in the top two or three in eight other majors, winning one is an experience he’ll remember forever. “I really don’t know what to say, to tell you how awesome it feels,” he says. Reflecting on his decade-plus journey to a win, Mickelson says the hardest part “has just been dealing with, I don’t want to say failure, but dealing with losses time after time.”

Tiger, who ties for twenty-second, is dealing with his own frustrations.

He has a plan, though. He’s going straight from the Masters in Georgia to the barracks in North Carolina, reporting for a few days of Special Forces training at Fort Bragg.

Time to shake things up.