Tiger Woods made waves on social media when he mentioned he would not take divots when he’s flushing it. Today, he defined what he meant.
@TaylorMadeGolf / X
Tiger Woods first amazed golf followers on the age of two. Clad in a white shirt with a pink collar, little Eldrick appeared on the Mike Douglas Show to indicate off his expertise with an outsized driver. Mini Tiger blasted a ball off the unreal turf, the gang oohed and awed, and golf was launched to its subsequent celebrity.
Forty-five years later, Woods nonetheless has that magic. From legendary major-championship runs to unthinkable comebacks, the final four-plus a long time have been filled with moments that left golf followers speechless.
Although his full-time enjoying days are behind him, Woods nonetheless has a knack for surprises — even among the many finest golfers on this planet.
Take Scottie Scheffler, for instance. In a video from TaylorMade earlier this yr (see above), the the top-ranked participant on this planet was left perplexed after watching Woods hit balls (29:47 mark).
“Hey, what’s with the no divots?” Scheffler mentioned.
“What?” Woods mentioned. “Why do you take a divot?”
Scheffler, a serious champion in his personal proper, was a bit dumbfounded.
“I’m just picking it,” Woods mentioned.
“Do you do that always when you’re warming up?” Scheffler responded.
“Uh-huh,” Woods mentioned. “When I’m swinging well, I don’t take divots.”
Scheffler’s face mentioned every thing you might want to know. He merely couldn’t imagine what he was listening to. Was it potential that the best iron participant of all time actually didn’t take divots? The video ended with none decision, and we have been all left with as many questions as Scheffler.
On Thursday, we lastly received some solutions. In a video shared by the TaylorMade content material group, they requested the 15-time main champion to elaborate on his no-divots remarks. The reply didn’t disappoint.
“I was wide and wide”
If you watch the video above and it feels like Woods is talking gibberish, fear not. Woods has at all times been a golf-swing nerd, and this video will get a bit bit within the weeds on the technical facet of the swing. But once you break it down, it makes plenty of sense.
Woods begins by saying early in his profession he was “wide and wide.” What he means is he was vast throughout his takeaway after which additionally vast on the downswing. As a end result, his swing path was in-to-out. You can see that illustrated within the image under from 2002. When the shaft is parallel to the bottom on the downswing, the clubhead continues to be inside his arms, that means he can be delivering the membership from the within.
Getty Images
“It was actually hard for me to take a divot when I was hitting it really well,” he says. “At that time, early 2000s, mid-2000s, even late 90s, my natural shot was a draw. So obviously, with the draw, you’re not going to be swinging that left, you’re not going to be that steep.”
With a shallow angle of assault, Woods doubtless didn’t take divots, or if he did, they have been fairly minimal. With the in-to-out swing path, he was way more of a sweeper than a digger, therefore the shallow (or nonexistent) divots.
“Yes, I didn’t take a lot of divots,” Woods says. “I would stand there for an entire day and you couldn’t really see where I was hitting golf balls at. Especially with long irons and anything up. Just because I was hitting draws.”
If he have been hitting a lower — requiring a steeper angle of assault and extra out-to-in path — it could be practically unimaginable to take no divot. But since he was sweeping the ball off the turf, the divots have been all however invisible.
“It would’ve been totally different if I was hitting punch cuts,” Woods says. “But my natural shot was a draw.”
Early-2000s Tiger had one of many biggest swings of all time, so it is sensible that he’d think about that when he was “flushing it.” And it seems that when the TaylorMade video was filmed, he was dialed in together with his draw.
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