![]() 1 in the Official World Golf Ranking for a record 683 weeks – a total of more than 13 years and more than twice the total of next-best Greg Norman – but in 2000, he achieved the highest point total ever, 29.40, which at the time nearly tripled the total of No. Most dominant player ever? Not only was Woods No. The most precocious player ever? His six Optimist Junior World age-group titles between the ages of 8 and 15 are definitive. Woods has plenty of numbers that can settle otherwise subjective arguments. He is three short of Jack Nicklaus’ iconic record of 18 professional majors, but his 15th major, the 2019 Masters, breathed renewed life into that epic chase. He is the only player ever to win four consecutive professional majors – the Tiger Slam – which is considered either superior, equivalent or inferior to Bob Jones’ Grand Slam, by approximately equally divided adherents. The 44-year-old Woods is currently tied with Sam Snead for the most PGA Tour victories at 82. The former prodigy who always preferred to let the clubs do the talking welcomes the day when he can let his records do the same. He knows not only the significance of his own records but also many important ones held by others, and definitely those he hopes to make his own. He knows they are history, and as such the truest measure of who got it done the most and who’s the best. Woods knows records, as both connoisseur and collector. Because it’s in their pursuit that Tiger Woods has always been at his best. Those he holds and those he’s challenged. ![]() Simply, where to begin is at the end, the place where everything is added up – the record. Until it finally dawns that the uniform excellence of Tiger’s craft, effort and most of all, results, over these last 30 years are all of a piece. Where to begin amid such a complex package and sprawling body of work is daunting. The last-hole celebrations whose unsettling explosions of momentarily unguarded emotion reveal just how much Woods’ greatness requires. The impassive competitive mask that unfailingly projects serene intentionality amid the highest tension. A panoply of shots that lodge in the collective memory for their genius blend of power, touch, precision, invention, nerve and momentous timing. The image of a golf swing so correct and graceful, in all its various iterations.
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