Chapter 66

Tiger Woods Learning Center

Anaheim, California

January 21, 2008

A photographer poses Kultida, Tiger, Elin, and seven-month-old Sam Woods against a larger-than-life backdrop: an eight-foot bronze statue of Earl and Tiger, arm in arm. As Tida holds Sam in her arms, the child gives her thirty-two-year-old father an adoring smile.

It’s an emotional day at the Tiger Woods Learning Center. “I have yet to go a day without thinking of my dad,” says Tiger. “I always thought my dad would live forever,” he admits. “I thought he was immortal. Obviously, we all know that’s not the case. But I wanted to be sure that I truly appreciated these days with my daughter.”

“Now that I’ve had Sam, it’s amazing how I keep reflecting on the things he taught me. I can’t wait to pass that on.”

Tiger’s set a personal goal for 2008: winning the calendar grand slam.

It’s raining in La Jolla on Sunday, January 27, but the stars line up for Tiger. He wins the Buick Invitational by eight strokes, tying him with Arnold Palmer’s sixty-two PGA Tour victories, behind only Ben Hogan (sixty-four), Jack Nicklaus (seventy-three), and Sam Snead (eighty-two).

From Orlando, the seventy-eight-year-old Arnold Palmer offers his congratulations. “I’m sure that there are many, many more coming in the future,” Palmer says. “There isn’t any question about that. I wish him all the luck in the world.”

Two more come quickly. In February, Tiger wins the WGC–Accenture Match Play Championship, and in March, with the King looking on from the 18th green at Bay Hill Club & Lodge, Tiger sinks a twenty-five-foot birdie to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational for the fifth time.

He removes his hat and spikes it into the ground in a victory celebration. “I was so into the moment of the putt going in and winning the golf tournament,” Tiger says, that when Steve Williams picks up his hat and returns it to him, Tiger asks his caddie a genuine question: “How in the hell did you get my hat?”

From the TV broadcast booth comes the call: “The perfect season is still alive.” Tiger has now surpassed Palmer and pulled even with Ben Hogan’s record.

Palmer and Tiger embrace. “It felt different than other years,” Palmer says. “Tiger’s father had passed away in 2006, and his relationship with his dad was as strong as mine was with Pap. Perhaps that came through when we shared that hug, and that in some small way he looked upon me as a father figure of sorts.”

At Isleworth, Tiger’s intense physical training continues to concern Team Tiger. He ignores an email from Hank Haney that asks, “You are already the fittest guy on the planet. Isn’t that enough?”

Tiger keeps watching Navy SEALs DVDs and incorporating the exercises into his routines. He trains with a former NFL defensive back. Wearing a weighted vest, he runs sets of ten sixty-yard wind sprints on the Isleworth practice tee.

Halfway through one set, Haney interrupts. “Tiger, you’re limping. C’mon, what are you doing?”

“No, I’m fine. This helps me build up [body] speed.”

His clubhead speed approaches 130 miles per hour.

During lunch at the Isleworth clubhouse, Tiger sees Shaquille O’Neal.

“How are you doing?” Tiger asks his friend and neighbor.

O’Neal missed thirty-nine games for the Miami Heat when he had surgery on his left knee during the 2006–2007 NBA season. In 2008, the knee is still sore.

“Trying to get through this thing with my knee,” O’Neal says.

Tiger nods in a silent show of understanding.

Visions of a 2008 calendar grand slam end at Augusta National.

Tiger finishes three strokes back from South African golfer Trevor Immelman, who bags his first major and second win on the PGA Tour.

“You have good weeks and bad weeks. Certainly, this was not one of my best,” Tiger says of this year’s Masters. He makes a decision that sends sportswriters chasing a new story: WOODS HAS ARTHROSCOPIC KNEE SURGERY reads a United Press International headline days later. In Park City, Utah, Tiger is under the care of Dr. Thomas Rosenberg, who performed Tiger’s previous procedure, in 2002.

“The upside is that I have been through this process before and know how to handle it,” Tiger says. The arthroscopic procedure—an interim step before reconstructive surgery, planned for the offseason—will need four to six weeks to heal.

Tiger pushes to get back into competitive form. “I work out. I lift, do my cardio, like I always do. Ice, yes. Stretch, yep. So it’s the same.” Though with his left knee unstable, the strain causes two stress fractures to the tibia in Tiger’s lower leg.

Hank Haney visits Tiger in Isleworth. Simply standing up from the dinner table puts enough stress on Tiger’s knee to send him doubling over in pain.

That’s not a good sign, Haney thinks. But Tiger is steadfast: he’ll play at the U.S. Open in mid-June.

Tiger’s agent, Mark Steinberg, confides in Mike Davis, CEO of the USGA, regarding the severity of the situation. “Mike, I need to share with you that Tiger has fractured his leg in a few places.”

Davis can’t believe what he’s hearing. “What?”

“Yeah, and he’s going to try to play,” Steinberg says. “I would ask you not to share that information with anybody.”

“So he’s going to play on a broken leg?” Davis is incredulous.

Tiger flies west to California, where he tries playing with a knee brace. It doesn’t work. On the drive from Newport Beach to San Diego, he tosses the brace from the car window.