If there was something that everyone remembers about Tiger Woods, apart from his innumerable title wins, it is that he always tinkered with his tools and skills. Many might remember his famous swing change from 1997 to 1999. Some might also have seen him change his equipment over the years. However, they were usually after he spotted an error in his ways himself. However, in 2003, Woods was left frustrated after one of his rivals showed him an error in his equipment, which .
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For about two years, the 82-time champion only had two top-10 finishes in eight majors, neither of which was a win. That’s when he was tinkering with his equipment for a while. While the lack of success in majors was a big reason behind it, he was also infuriated because one of his opponents was outplaying him. A 49-year-old Marc Farry was “smoking” a 28-year-old Woods from the tee spot by 10 yards in the third round, as quoted by Evin Priest on the Tee It Up podcast.
The two were paired together in the third round of the 2003 Deutsche Bank – SAP Open TPC of Europe. While neither of the players won the tournament, Parry did finish 17 spots above Woods. However, the deficit between the two would have been much greater had the big cat not spotted how much better Marc was off the tee. And Priest also stated that Parry played a key role in helping Woods find better equipment.
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The golf expert said, “Afterwards, they basically decided, it must be this driver he was using. TaylorMade had come out with a new driver at the time.” After Tiger and his caddie, Steve Williams, concluded that it was his driver that was doing the magic, they tested the theory by borrowing the driver. And voilà, it worked. Woods was now hitting tee shots 15 yards longer than he did with his Nike driver. That was enough to convince him to change his driver for the final round.
Nike had partnered with Woods by the time he turned pro in 1996, forging a 27-year long relationship that ended in 2024. At that time, however, it seems that Nike led Woods down during a crucial period of his career.
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via Imago
Bilder des Jahres 2024, Sport 12 Dezember Sport Themen der Woche KW51 Sport Bilder des Tages PGA, Golf Herren PNC Championship Dec 22, 2024 Orlando, Florida, USA Tiger Woods lines up a putt on a playoff hole during the PNC Championship at The Ritz-Carlton Golf Club. Orlando The Ritz-Carlton Golf Club Florida USA, EDITORIAL USE ONLY PUBLICATIONxINxGERxSUIxAUTxONLY Copyright: xNathanxRayxSeebeckx 20241222_nrs_fo8_0020
Woods, who was struggling all throughout the tournament, got his best score of 4-under 68 on Championship Sunday. He jumped up 9 spots above where he started the day. That was how Woods’s journey with the iconic brand began. However, he wasn’t able to immediately perfect using the TaylorMade equipment as soon as he started using it. Just like any part of his storied career, Tiger Woods took some time to get back in form. And when he did, he came back with a bang.
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Tiger Woods goes on another wild run
The new TaylorMade driver may not have been effective immediately. Even if Tiger Woods was able to hit longer, he still needed to find consistency playing with it to get back to winning ways. And for the remainder of 2003 and throughout 2004, the big cat took his sweet time to get used to his new equipment. But by 2005, fans saw a new version of Mr. T.
With TaylorMade in his bag, Woods unleashed himself on the PGA Tour and went on an unbelievable winning run. He won 6 titles in 2005, including two majors. Fans saw the same and much more of it in 2006 as the big cat won 8 titles with 2 majors that season. In fact, he didn’t stop until the end of 2009, when he had the infamous accident. That was probably the only thing that could have stopped Tiger Woods from winning more PGA Tour titles.
