5 Resilience Lessons by Tiger Woods

UPDATE September 23rd 2018: BBC: "An emotional Tiger Woods completed an astonishing comeback to win the season-ending Tour Championship by two shots and record his first win in five years."

Tiger Woods had an incredible weekend, finishing in second place in the PGA Championship golf tournament at Bellerive Country Club. It's just a matter of time before Eldrick Tont Woods aka Tiger Woods adds to incredible tally of 14 'Major' championship wins. On August 12th, the 42-year-old lost out to fellow American Brooks Koepka who declared: 

"Other than me, my team, everybody was rooting for Tiger. It kind of pushes you to step up your game."

Without naming it; Brooks Koepka is referring to the phenomena known as the "Tiger Effect". TW can drive consumers to stores and viewers to their televisions. "His endorsement alone increases our sales 30 percent, even if he's not playing," then-CEO of Bridgestone Angel Ilagan told CNBC in April. "If he wins, we're in a whole lot of trouble, because we're not going to be able to make enough product."Nielsen calculates that Woods drives an average of almost 2.9 million extra viewers for every tournament he plays in.

TW drives crowds like never before. People know that when (not if) he wins his next tournament it will effectively be one of the greatest comebacks in sport history. 

Yet, his career/life touched a low point in May 2017 when he got arrested in Florida after being found asleep at the wheel of his car. He was charged with driving under the influence, having slurred words and being incapable of walking in a straight line." Reports revealed THC, Vicodin, Dilaudid, Xanax, and Ambien in his blood...

This had led The Guardian to publish the article: ? Tiger Woods: a lost, sorry soul who was once invincible ? in June 2017. ? At the peak of his powers, Tiger Woods was a golfer who dominated all before him. He hauled his sport into a fresh commercial landscape before injury and loss of form meant he could no longer compete with the best. When he began to toil on the course – perhaps even more so than when he was recording stunning achievements as standard – he became captivating viewing. ?

Lesson 1 : Do not hesitate to dramatically change the way you do things

He rebuilt his physique but also had to relearn his technique. His coach’s biomechanical expertise helped find a swing which took the pressure off the lower back, and a higher finish which didn’t twist the body. He created a blueprint for Tiger,” says PGA pro and swing expert Dan Whittaker. To this date, he is the only competitive player who had to undergo this type of surgery.

Experts Break Down Tiger Woods’ Post-Injury Masters Swing

Lesson 2 : Do not take yourself so seriously. Adopt a positive winning attitude

Tiger Woods now appears more relaxed, talking to spectators and telling stories during interviews.  “He was relaxed and enjoying himself,” Harrington said after 18th holes. “Back in the day it was very much business. So yeah, he’s a different person. All of the other times he kept coming back there was so much negativity. Everybody seems delighted just to have Tiger back. He looks like he’s really missed it, and he really looks happy to be out there. ?

That’s not to say he’s an uncompetitive one. He still curses when his shots are anything less than perfect. He still gets as frustrated as he did five or six years ago but he now has a more wining attitude.

 “If you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?” Tiger Woods

Lesson 3 : You don’t have to be the best at everything

Even when he was at his peak, Woods was not the best putter, he certainly did not have the longest drive, or the most flawsless swing. Yet, he stayed the world’s top-ranked player for an unprecedented 683 weeks.

“People don’t understand that when I grew up, I was never the most talented, I was never the biggest, I was never the fastest, I certainly was never the strongest. The only thing I had was my work ethic, and that’s been what has gotten me this far.” Tiger Woods

Lesson 4 : Keep on improving, never give up

Woods may not be the best human on the planet, nor the best husband, but he is an extraordinary example of resilience.

"To understand Woods’ rediscovered heights, consider the place he sunk to. He is unrecognizable from the bleary-eyed Woods so dazed by prescription painkillers he couldn’t walk for police, or the Woods who glumly admitted he might never play golf again. After two great back-to-back finishes, he is back in contention, even topping the PGA Tour’s club head speed – impressive for a player in their 40s, unfathomable for someone a year out from surgery on their spine." (Independent.co.uk)

“It’s been a tough road,” Woods said. “The amount of times I’ve fallen because my leg didn’t work or I just had to lay on the ground in pain for extended periods of time. Those are some really dark, dark times. I’m a walking miracle … I don’t know if anyone who’s had a lower back fusion can swing the club as fast as I can swing it. That’s incredible.”

Despite been told by medical experts he would never play again, despite all the experts claiming he couldn't complete, Woods has continued to improve his swing through adversity and appears to be on the verge of one of the greatest sporting achievements of all time.

Lesson 5 : Do not take anything for granted

Tiger Woods was the best player in his sport. Here are 5 facts from his dominance era:

1. He has been World Number One for the most consecutive weeks and for the greatest total number of weeks of any golfer
2. He has been awarded PGA Player of the Year a record eleven times
3. He has won 14 professional major golf championships, and 79 PGA Tour events. This represents a record 23.2% (79 out of 340) of his professional starts on the PGA Tour
4. Woods is the only player to have won all four professional major championships in a row, accomplishing the feat in the 2000–2001 seasons. This feat became known as the "Tiger Slam"
5. Woods has signed a USD 100M contract with Nike and is regularly among the top paid athletes in the world

From one day to another he couldn’t finish any tournament because of pain, let alone win 4 back-to-back major like he has done in the past.

After infamous extra-marital affairs, knee and back injuries, and 10 years without winning a major, Tiger Woods was supposedly done for. He was left for dead. Whenever he showed up on a course, it was only to embarrass himself. One can only start to imagine how hard it must have been for Woods to endure such a drought, in both his personal and professional life. 

Tiger Woods drops to his knees in pain during final round of The Barclays (20")