Speaker 1: Hooked, hitched and hung up. Acknowledges the traditional custodians of
Speaker 1: country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community.
Speaker 1: We pay our respect to their elders past and present
Speaker 1: and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Speaker 1: Islander peoples today.
Speaker 2: This episode was recorded on wella Medical Land. Looks like
Speaker 2: you've got a text there, babe?
Speaker 1: Oh oh did I?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Okay, who's it from. It's from my mom.
Speaker 1: She she wants to know what to get me for
Speaker 1: my birthday. Oh okay, your mother again? Uh no, my doctor?
Speaker 1: Well what does he want? Is everything? Okay? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he just wants to know what to get me my
Speaker 1: mother for her birthday. Oh so he knows her mm hmm.
Speaker 1: My manager, Oh, your manager, he wants to know what
Speaker 1: to get my doctor for his birthday.
Speaker 2: Oh well, there's lots of birthdays this time a year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's a pretty busy time of year. Tiger
Speaker 1: Woods had a lot on his plate. In two thousand
Speaker 1: and nine, he was the most successful athlete in the world. Literally,
Speaker 1: that is not even an exaggeration. He was a mogul
Speaker 1: of the golf business and a role model for children
Speaker 1: of color across the world. Oh and he was reportedly
Speaker 1: juggling something like one hundred different women and try and
Speaker 1: keep them all hidden from his wife, Elin Nordegren, busy
Speaker 1: man me Hi, I'm Laura and Iron Britt. And this
Speaker 1: is Hooked, Hitched and hung up where we dissect the fallouts,
Speaker 1: the forever afters, and the biggest celebrity relationships of all time.
Speaker 1: And this is one of the biggest. This is the
Speaker 1: quintessential full from grace. We have never seen anything like
Speaker 1: it to this day. But to understand how far Tiger
Speaker 1: Woods fell at the end of the two thousands, you
Speaker 1: have to understand just how high his peak was. Now,
Speaker 1: this is something I assume, whether you like golf or not,
Speaker 1: around the world, you know who Tiger Woods is. Correct.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna let you in on a little secret.
Speaker 2: I hate golfsk I know who Tiger Woods.
Speaker 1: But you know right, So this this story of Tiger Woods.
Speaker 1: Before anyone checks out and says I hate golf, this
Speaker 1: is not about golf. There are so this is like
Speaker 1: an onion. There are so many layers to it, and
Speaker 1: I became pretty obsessed with this story.
Speaker 2: It has almost nothing to do with golf. I mean
Speaker 2: a little bit, but it has.
Speaker 1: Way more to do golfer in the world, Yes, but.
Speaker 2: It has way more to do with like the cheating,
Speaker 2: the scandal, like the how would you react if you
Speaker 2: found out that your husband was a lying narcissist? You know,
Speaker 2: like it's got so much to it. Well, I think
Speaker 2: we need to start back at the beginning.
Speaker 1: And when I say the beginning, I'm talking about Tiger
Speaker 1: Woods being two years old. That's really back at the beginning.
Speaker 1: But I had no idea. At two years old Tiger
Speaker 1: Woods was swinging a golf club with so much precision.
Speaker 1: If you didn't see it, you wouldn't have believed it.
Speaker 2: Old are you.
Speaker 1: Too too? He became very very good at a very
Speaker 1: young age, and that was because his dad was very
Speaker 1: into golf. So he used to sit in his garage
Speaker 1: while he was eating his little wheat bigs at two
Speaker 1: years old, and his dad had like one of those
Speaker 1: golf nets in the garage, so he would just hit
Speaker 1: ball after ball after ball into the golf net. So
Speaker 1: from age literally from a newborn to age two, little
Speaker 1: baby Tiger Woods was watching his dad play golf. Then
Speaker 1: he started to play at two years old.
Speaker 2: I don't know any two year old that likes doing
Speaker 2: the one thing apart from watching Coco Melon that much
Speaker 2: that there must be some sort of like regimented parenting
Speaker 2: that comes in here.
Speaker 1: Oh so, very very regimented. So both his mother and
Speaker 1: his father looking back, they were both obsessed with making
Speaker 1: him become the best golfer of all time from a
Speaker 1: very young age. But his dad was in the military.
Speaker 1: His mum was just like so loving and nurturing, but
Speaker 1: she was also very strict. She was the one that,
Speaker 1: would you know, she she's a spank him. She's just
Speaker 1: smack him if he was out of line. But that
Speaker 1: was pretty common. That was nothing out of the ord
Speaker 1: n different back in those days. But his dad was
Speaker 1: a Vietnam there. Yeah, so his dad was very strict,
Speaker 1: but they became very very close. Now. The thing with
Speaker 1: Tiger Woods is from a very young age, Tiger Woods
Speaker 1: made golf call I don't know. I used to look
Speaker 1: at golf. It was like a really nerdy sport. I
Speaker 1: was like the nerds play golf because it's it didn't
Speaker 1: seem like he had to be very athletic. There was
Speaker 1: no one that was very handsome or hot. You know,
Speaker 1: they were all the footballers and the soccer players. Becker
Speaker 1: could he deliver this time? Tiger Woods literally reinvented golf.
Speaker 1: He was this hot, young, incredible superstar that came ripping through.
Speaker 1: He went from being a very shy young boy. He
Speaker 1: had a stutter, and he was so shy because of
Speaker 1: the stutter. And the way he overcame the stutter was
Speaker 1: every night he used to sit down with the family
Speaker 1: dog and he used to talk to the dog until
Speaker 1: the dog fell asleep, I know. And that's how he
Speaker 1: got over his stutter. So Tiger was this full on
Speaker 1: child prodigy. He was actually a freak of nature. He
Speaker 1: featured in Golfers Digest. At five years old, he was
Speaker 1: on Good Morning America, ESPN, CBS, NBC, ABC. Now these
Speaker 1: are all American shows for those of you don't know, but
Speaker 1: these are the big, big shows. Hey, Tiger, what's saying
Speaker 1: I going to bring you ill? What do you wanted
Speaker 1: to bring you? Hava? One hour and a two. He
Speaker 1: got his first hole in one at age six, and
Speaker 1: he started dominating the amateur competitions and winning golf scholarships
Speaker 1: to Stanford after finishing high school.
Speaker 2: This poor guy is like a kid, and I'm already
Speaker 2: waiting for his life to unravel because it's just so much.
Speaker 2: It's so much pressure, Like no one person can carry
Speaker 2: that much pressure for as long as he did well.
Speaker 1: And this is the thing. He had all this pressure
Speaker 1: on him to be the number one golfer in the world.
Speaker 1: He had all this pressure of him to fix racism
Speaker 1: and unite the world. And he used to talk about
Speaker 1: this all the time. So imagine if you're a teenager
Speaker 1: or child, and a teenager feeling that pressure on you
Speaker 1: from two years old, that's all the poor kid had
Speaker 1: ever known.
Speaker 2: I mean, if there was ever a recipe for creating
Speaker 2: someone who had like the most insane level of god complay,
Speaker 2: because I feel like this is probably it. Sprinkle a
Speaker 2: little bit on and there you go. Narcissism. Here we
Speaker 2: are in the making, narcissist in the making. I want
Speaker 2: to tell you about someone called Joe Groman.
Speaker 1: Now, Joe is a really integral part of Tiger's life,
Speaker 1: and he's an integral part of his story. So Joe
Speaker 1: was a golf pro and I guess he acted like
Speaker 1: a mentor to Tiger from a young age. He taught him,
Speaker 1: he was a friend to him. So from thirteen basically
Speaker 1: till he turned pro, I literally, you know, had him
Speaker 1: all to myself at the Navy golf of course. So
Speaker 1: he's a caddy for him, his junior stuff played in
Speaker 1: practice with him every single day for years. But Joe
Speaker 1: often talks about Tiger's dad. Tiger's Dad's name is Earl.
Speaker 1: They all used to play golf together all the time,
Speaker 1: and Joe often talks about the fact that there was
Speaker 1: this level of insane It almost came across as taunting,
Speaker 1: and I guess a level of bullying that Earl used
Speaker 1: to inflict on Tiger on the golf course. And the
Speaker 1: first time it happened, Tiger would be making a shot
Speaker 1: and at the critical time his dad would start to
Speaker 1: talk to him or would walk part like kick his
Speaker 1: foot a little bit with jingle his keys a little bit.
Speaker 1: Was like very rude and obnoxious, and Joe was like,
Speaker 1: bro at the end, after a couple of times, Joe
Speaker 1: was like, Bro, what are you doing? Like this is
Speaker 1: really rude. We all know that we should be respectful
Speaker 1: on the golf course and have silence when someone's taking
Speaker 1: it apart and you're like literally literally belittling your child. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but Earl had said, no, this is this is part
Speaker 1: of his training. I'm teaching him to be able to
Speaker 1: block out excess noise. So in a way I get
Speaker 1: what he's saying because when you've seen when people playing golf,
Speaker 1: there are huge crowds, there are people talking, there are
Speaker 1: outside noises, distractions. So he was trying to set him
Speaker 1: up so that he could block out everything and take
Speaker 1: the shot. And it worked because Tiger his tactic was
Speaker 1: to almost hypnotize himself. So when he was taking a
Speaker 1: shot and you can see it happening, he glazes over
Speaker 1: and it's like he's not even there anymore. It's like
Speaker 1: he's a different person, glazes over, blocks everyone out, hypnotizes himself,
Speaker 1: takes a shot, and he's a freak like he almost
Speaker 1: never never misses. You just sort of like drop into
Speaker 1: another zone and you block out everything.
Speaker 2: That's really helped me. It just seems like such a
Speaker 2: toxic imbalance of power between a dad and a son.
Speaker 1: I mean, in hindsight, it for sure was. There was
Speaker 1: definitely an imbalance and it was a very strange relationship.
Speaker 1: But what it allowed Tiger to do is and everyone
Speaker 1: used to say, on the course, he was a different person.
Speaker 1: He had like this double life. He was able to
Speaker 1: compartmentalize what happened on the golf course to what happened outside,
Speaker 1: and that is probably how he ended up having the
Speaker 1: life he did.
Speaker 2: Okay, So, was anything about Tiger Woods's childhood in quotation
Speaker 2: marks normal?
Speaker 1: I mean probably one thing. He did have a childhood sweetheart.
Speaker 1: Her name was Dina, and she was his very first girlfriend. Now,
Speaker 1: even in high school. Dina says that he's I mean,
Speaker 1: we're talking about fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, like high school boys.
Speaker 1: But he's already a freak at golf, and she says,
Speaker 1: already people would swarm him. There were already so many fans.
Speaker 1: But they had a really beautiful relationship until one day
Speaker 1: out of the blue, even though they're in love, even
Speaker 1: though nothing had gone wrong, she thought the relationship was fine,
Speaker 1: she gets a letter from Tiger.
Speaker 2: Wait, I'm sorry, before you get into what the letter said,
Speaker 2: How the hell does the letters still exist?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: Who has who keeps a hold of a letter from
Speaker 2: when they're fifteen they get broken up with.
Speaker 1: I have a sentimental box of stuff from when I
Speaker 1: was a teenager.
Speaker 2: Of breakup letters your ex boyfriend when you were fifteen.
Speaker 2: You keep that.
Speaker 1: Dina still has it. She we see Dina in the
Speaker 1: Tiger documentary. We see her read out the note. So like,
Speaker 1: I'm not even making this shit up. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel like to die. I threw out
Speaker 1: my box.
Speaker 2: I had a box, and then during one bad breakup,
Speaker 2: I threw out my entire box. Also had some very
Speaker 2: important things like funeral notices from my grandparents, and so
Speaker 2: it was horrible. I just was like, I'm done with
Speaker 2: this part of my life.
Speaker 1: Threw it all out. Well, this is really sad because
Speaker 1: from all accounts, they were a young couple in love,
Speaker 1: first love. There's nothing like your first love, and she
Speaker 1: was blindsided. He started to obviously, you know he's a
Speaker 1: horny teenager as well. You start to spend time with
Speaker 1: your girlfriend like he thinks with his penis. He wants
Speaker 1: to be around her, They want to be together. His
Speaker 1: parents don't like that because because that doesn't go with
Speaker 1: the idea of him becoming this prodigy, this golf prodigy.
Speaker 1: So they make Tiger break up with Dina. So what's
Speaker 1: the letter? All right, I'm going to read to you, Dina.
Speaker 1: The reason for writing this letter is to inform you
Speaker 1: that my parents and myself never want to talk or
Speaker 1: hear from you again. Reflecting back over this relationship, I
Speaker 1: feel used and manipulated by you and your family. I
Speaker 1: hope the rest of your life runs well for you.
Speaker 1: I know this is sudden and a surprise, but it is,
Speaker 1: in my opinion, much warranted. Sincerely, Tiger, what them okay?
Speaker 1: What an a personality type? Or his mum wrote that?
Speaker 1: Year old kid is writing that.
Speaker 2: Also, Like you're imagine getting your mum to write your
Speaker 2: breakup letter for you.
Speaker 1: Imagine being Imagine being in love, nothing's wrong, and then
Speaker 1: you get a letter saying psych never want to see
Speaker 1: you or speak to you again, you or your family.
Speaker 2: I think the worst part of that is like being
Speaker 2: accused of being manipulative, especially when the letter itself is
Speaker 2: what is manipulative?
Speaker 1: Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like, there's obviously an ulterior motive, and that's because it's
Speaker 2: taking away attention, energy and focus from this blooming golf career.
Speaker 2: But that was the real that was the real catalyst
Speaker 2: for this breakup.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it comes It's so evident it comes from
Speaker 1: his parents because we are then shown in this documentary.
Speaker 1: We're then shown Tiger's dad, Earl, giving a speech and
Speaker 1: talking about him in front of a whole crowd. This
Speaker 1: is what his dad says. He will transcend this game
Speaker 1: and bring the world a humanitarianism which has never been
Speaker 1: known before, the world will be a better place to
Speaker 1: live in by virtue of his existence and his presence.
Speaker 1: I acknowledge only a small part in that, in that
Speaker 1: I know that I was personally selected by God himself
Speaker 1: to nurture this young man and bring him to the
Speaker 1: point where he can make his contribution to humanity. It
Speaker 1: is golf we're talking about, and he's a teenager and
Speaker 1: you are not God, God talking about Like, that's.
Speaker 2: The thing that's so crazy, is like the fact that
Speaker 2: this is the whole thing was put on such a pedestal.
Speaker 1: And I understand.
Speaker 2: I know that there is like the media surrounding him,
Speaker 2: like the money as well, the fame.
Speaker 1: All of that is like it creates this God complex.
Speaker 2: But is there any wonder why he couldn't keep a
Speaker 2: normal relationship together anyone.
Speaker 1: Dick in his pants? No, He's essentially been told his
Speaker 1: whole life is God. Of course he thinks he can
Speaker 1: go and do what he did. And speaking of pressure,
Speaker 1: you have to imagine there was a lot of extra
Speaker 1: external pressure, like racism. So this is a time where
Speaker 1: you know, people of color weren't even allowed to play
Speaker 1: on a lot of courses. And in nineteen ninety, there
Speaker 1: is an interview with Transworld Sport and Tiger says, every
Speaker 1: time I go to a major country club, you always
Speaker 1: feel it, why are you here? You're not supposed to
Speaker 1: be here. So as a really young kid, even though
Speaker 1: he's turning into someone that's going to be the best
Speaker 1: in his sport, he still wasn't and didn't feel welcome,
Speaker 1: and he feels like he sticks out like a sore thumb. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and I guess he did because this was very much
Speaker 1: a male dominated, white sport. It's like the whitest of
Speaker 1: white sports. Yeah. Well, the course that he actually won
Speaker 1: his first Masters is called Augusta. They didn't even have
Speaker 1: a black member until nineteen ninety. They didn't even have
Speaker 1: a female member until twenty twelve. There are even stories
Speaker 1: about Tiger not even being able to change in the
Speaker 1: same change room as his friends and competitors, like he's
Speaker 1: playing with them, he's out there, he's whipping their butt.
Speaker 1: He can't even change in the same change room. Could
Speaker 1: you imagine why couldn't he change in the He was
Speaker 1: a person of color. That's just what it was. And
Speaker 1: I think it's very easy for us to all forget that,
Speaker 1: to have a level of ignorance and not realize exactly
Speaker 1: what was going on.
Speaker 2: That is so outrageous, isn't it that that was Like,
Speaker 2: I mean not even was it in our lifetime, Like,
Speaker 2: it's so recent that this was happening.
Speaker 1: So he left college at twenty years old to turn pro.
Speaker 1: Pretty much, he signed with Nike and Titleists straight off
Speaker 1: the bat, and they were the most lucrative sponsorship deals
Speaker 1: in the history of golf. So think of this twenty
Speaker 1: year old now that's already been told he's God, that
Speaker 1: has just been given from nothing, all this money. All
Speaker 1: of a sudden, he's got more money than you could
Speaker 1: ever spend.
Speaker 2: You have the pressure of the media frenzy surrounding it,
Speaker 2: but then you also had the pressure of the monetary
Speaker 2: aspect of it too.
Speaker 1: As the world looking in watching Tiger play golf, we
Speaker 1: saw somebody that he was like a sociopath. This showed
Speaker 1: no motion unless he won or did something that was really,
Speaker 1: really brilliant. He would not laugh, smile, really talk to anyone.
Speaker 1: But when he won a tournament, that was when it stopped.
Speaker 1: He was like switched off, was happy, hugged his dad,
Speaker 1: hugged his caddy wave to the audience. But whilst he
Speaker 1: was playing, he was just like a robot. But we
Speaker 1: saw him rise to number one faster than anyone else
Speaker 1: in history. So he became number one in nineteen ninety seven,
Speaker 1: and he remained number one longer than anyone else ever.
Speaker 1: Had two hundred and sixty four weeks in a row.
Speaker 1: So that's two hundred and sixty four weeks in this
Speaker 1: little pressure cooker that was his life. There are cameras
Speaker 1: always on him. There's this pressure to not lose your
Speaker 1: number one spot. You need to stay there now you've
Speaker 1: got there. The pressure of the world, the pressure of Nike,
Speaker 1: the pressure of sponsors, discipline.
Speaker 2: When you're at this point and at the top of
Speaker 2: your game, I don't really have time for love and relationships.
Speaker 2: And we know that this is a podcast about the
Speaker 2: love and the relationships that have blossomed and probably turned
Speaker 2: into a shitfire. Where does aline come into this right now?
Speaker 1: Funny you should ask. At the top of his game,
Speaker 1: he's number one, he can't get better, probably couldn't get
Speaker 1: more money. Well, actually he got a lot more money.
Speaker 1: Top of the world, handsome, killing it. This is where
Speaker 1: he meets Elin Nordegren. But let me tell you, Laura,
Speaker 1: being the number one golfer in the world does not
Speaker 1: make you cool. And Tiger Woods was not cool yet.
Speaker 1: I mean that came later, but he was not cool.
Speaker 1: So wait, let me guess. Did Tiger get his mum
Speaker 1: to ask her out? Well, it's not that bad, but
Speaker 1: actually it's it's pretty close. Elan, hi, Hi, listen, I'm
Speaker 1: actually getting a little bit nervous. Nervous, nervous. Why I'm okay,
Speaker 1: I'm okay, I'm okay, okay, you can do it. Okay.
Speaker 1: I came over to actually ask you out. Oh you did? Yeah,
Speaker 1: not for me on behalf of Tiger Woods. Sorry wait
Speaker 1: what wait?
Speaker 2: So Tiger Woods, Yes, Tiger Woods, top of his game,
Speaker 2: professional sports player, supposedly the coolest of the cool of
Speaker 2: the cool. He got his friend to ask her out. Yes,
Speaker 2: he couldn't even do it. Wait, just like he got
Speaker 2: his mum to write the break up letter when he
Speaker 2: was fifteen.
Speaker 1: Ye're seeing a pattern here, people. He's not his own human.
Speaker 1: He literally he was too nervous. But look in his defense,
Speaker 1: if you guys haven't seen Elin and what she looks like,
Speaker 1: she is so beautiful. I'd be scared in my pants too.
Speaker 2: This is the problem, okay, when you're not used to losing,
Speaker 2: when you're not used to rejection, it makes it so
Speaker 2: much scarier. Like he has never had to deal with
Speaker 2: these sorts of things because he's always been a winner.
Speaker 2: So putting yourself in a situation where you might not
Speaker 2: be a winner is really really frightening.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry though, But if I'm an adult, which I
Speaker 1: am luckily, so I can talk about the fact. I mean,
Speaker 1: that would be so crazy, brittanythetically, if I were an adult,
Speaker 1: if somebody asked me out for their friend for a friend,
Speaker 1: it is laughable. It would unless it's Sam Hewan or
Speaker 1: one of my hall passes. I would be like, what
Speaker 1: a childish immature, and I would think it was a joke.
Speaker 1: I'd feel like I was sixteen years old and it
Speaker 1: was like a prank. You know, when you send at
Speaker 1: school and you're like, will you go out with me?
Speaker 1: And you have two boxes. Yes, no, maybe you'd always tick,
Speaker 1: maybe because you're like, I'll make him sweat it.
Speaker 2: It makes you a bit of a scaredy pants. It's a
Speaker 2: little bit you're a little bit of a loser.
Speaker 1: Imagine having one hundred million dollars and be like, make
Speaker 1: can you go ask that girl out? Anyway? Where was
Speaker 1: he hiding? Like in the corner, like is he steady tree?
Speaker 1: And behind like the wet weather shed just in case
Speaker 1: he's like holding up his golf club behind the golf
Speaker 1: club volcano dying.
Speaker 2: I mean, we can make fun of all this and
Speaker 2: how it wouldn't really fly for us, but apparently it
Speaker 2: worked for Elin.
Speaker 1: Well actually no, I mean yes I did. Eventually she
Speaker 1: thought it was ridiculous, so she said no, she wasn't interested,
Speaker 1: and she was quite like a reserved and shy person.
Speaker 1: And that life at this sporting life, the famous life,
Speaker 1: the athlete life. She'd been around it a lot. She'd
Speaker 1: been on that golf tour a lot with other golfers.
Speaker 2: Now the reason why before anyone thinks she was just
Speaker 2: making the rounds, she was a nanny for a golfer.
Speaker 1: She was a nanny for another golfer, for another couple.
Speaker 1: So she had been around that area for a long
Speaker 1: time and she wasn't. It didn't impress her, so she
Speaker 1: said no. He kept hassling it. He kept calling the
Speaker 1: house that she worked at, asking if he.
Speaker 2: Started doing this or was it somebody else. Hey, I'm
Speaker 2: just calling you on behalf of Tiger Woods again. He
Speaker 2: would like to take you out for dinner.
Speaker 1: No, he started to just call the house and ask
Speaker 1: her out. She eventually said yes. They started dating, and
Speaker 1: they fell in love, and all of a sudden they
Speaker 1: were seen everywhere together. She was very supportive. She was
Speaker 1: always on the tours, she was always in the crowd,
Speaker 1: and they were just this beautiful, like the most beautiful
Speaker 1: couple of all time.
Speaker 2: Imagine going from being like the nanny to some other
Speaker 2: golfer to being Tiger Woods's plus one.
Speaker 1: Totally with one hundred million dollars. I mean, I didn't
Speaker 1: kill what anyone says, one hundred million dollars is a pricing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it makes you penny struck a little bit, doesn't it?
Speaker 1: From that?
Speaker 2: This is holl Titched and hung Up, where we take
Speaker 2: you through the most momentous love stories of our time,
Speaker 2: and today it's Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren, the woman
Speaker 2: who would become his wife, and then his ex wife Britt.
Speaker 1: What do we know about Elan? Now, we don't actually
Speaker 1: hear a lot from Elan because she's a private person.
Speaker 1: It's actually hard to dig up any information from her,
Speaker 1: or quotes or anything like that. Her friend had come
Speaker 1: forward and say, Elan told me that he didn't make
Speaker 1: a great impression on her. At first. She had her
Speaker 1: opinions about celebrities and they were not high, and she's
Speaker 1: very shy, so the idea of joining that world was
Speaker 1: not appealing to her, and when he asked her out,
Speaker 1: I think she turned him down at first. She gradually
Speaker 1: was convinced that she should give him a chance, and
Speaker 1: so they did go out. Initially, her reaction was what
Speaker 1: the hell was that? She thought it was so weird
Speaker 1: and pathetic, So of course she said no, referring to
Speaker 1: when he sent old mate over to ask her out.
Speaker 1: So she definitely wasn't about that life. And I guess
Speaker 1: a little bit of history about Elin is her family
Speaker 1: were doing just fine on their own, so she was
Speaker 1: really worried that she'd be perceived as like this gold digger.
Speaker 1: But her mum was a very successful politician. Her twin
Speaker 1: sister ended up being a lawyer. They didn't really want
Speaker 1: for money, and they had a level of intelligence and
Speaker 1: success that she thought was enough. She didn't think she
Speaker 1: needed to go and chase money or somebody that was
Speaker 1: so highly successful that would put a spotlight on her.
Speaker 1: I think she was comfortable in the life that her
Speaker 1: and her family had.
Speaker 2: There was a part of this where she resisted becoming
Speaker 2: a wag, you know, because as you know, like if
Speaker 2: you're going to date someone who's a professional sportsperson, your
Speaker 2: dreams and ambitions come second to their career.
Speaker 1: Well, she was at one of the top one hundred
Speaker 1: universities in the world. She did child psychology. She's not
Speaker 1: an idiot. She then on the side, she was a model,
Speaker 1: Like what more could you want? Match smartin that wealthy
Speaker 1: and that hole. I can't imagine, but I would love
Speaker 1: to imagine. Okay, fast forward to two years of dating
Speaker 1: Bliss and the world being obsessed with them. We find
Speaker 1: ourselves in two thousand and three, and we find ourselves
Speaker 1: in South Africa. So Tiger took Elind there to one
Speaker 1: of the tournaments. Now, a little crisis happened here when
Speaker 1: Tiger's team went into a bit of a meltdown. What happened, Well,
Speaker 1: they lost him, They lost him in South Africa. They
Speaker 1: lost Tiger and Elan, So they're all having his meltdown,
Speaker 1: like what's happened? But he came back a couple of
Speaker 1: hours later and Elin had a big, big, big fat
Speaker 1: engagement ring on her finger. So they had disappeared. He
Speaker 1: had proposed it, had their own little moment of privacy,
Speaker 1: and they came back engaged. They're engaged. They get married
Speaker 1: in two thousand and four with like a huge It
Speaker 1: was a two million dollar affair because he rented out
Speaker 1: an entire complex for a week, so they rented out
Speaker 1: Sandy Lane Resort in Barbados. It was a golf course
Speaker 1: of course, the whole thing, so it could be private.
Speaker 1: It wasn't private. The paparazzi ended up coming in. It
Speaker 1: was a whole big kerfuffle. They don't have a private
Speaker 1: moment again in their life. But they get married, as
Speaker 1: we are all shown, it's a very beautiful affair. In
Speaker 1: two thousand and seven, they welcomed their first child. They
Speaker 1: had a daughter called Sam and then their second child,
Speaker 1: which was a son, Charlie in February of two thousand
Speaker 1: and nine. So, now to the world, they're a really
Speaker 1: beautiful family unit. They've got two beautiful kids, they got
Speaker 1: all the money. They're beautiful.
Speaker 2: They're like absolute couple goals at the top of their game.
Speaker 2: They are the pinnacle of what a perfect little family
Speaker 2: looks like.
Speaker 1: This is a thing, isn't it. When you're at the peak,
Speaker 1: you're at the very top. There is literally nowhere else
Speaker 1: to go but down and down. He went on many women,
Speaker 1: he went down on anywhere. I love it when I
Speaker 1: nail it. So in two thousand and six, there, okay,
Speaker 1: so he does his life does start to unravel. In
Speaker 1: two thousand and six, he his dad, Earl dies. Now
Speaker 1: they have both done so many interviews over the years,
Speaker 1: stating both of them that they're each other's best friends,
Speaker 1: that they're each other's entire world. And his dad wasn't
Speaker 1: an angel. His dad and his mom had been married
Speaker 1: their entire life, and from the outside it looked like
Speaker 1: they had a beautiful family unit. His dad was chasing
Speaker 1: tail NonStop on the golf course, and Tiger knew that.
Speaker 1: Tiger saw that his dad had been cheating on his mum,
Speaker 1: Tiger's caddy Joe was doing the same thing. So as
Speaker 1: a young kid, the only two men that you have
Speaker 1: in your life are cheating on their partners, are cheating
Speaker 1: on their.
Speaker 2: Wife and setting this precedent as though that is normal,
Speaker 2: because like what is normal to him, his version of
Speaker 2: normal in this world is so warped in comparison what
Speaker 2: the rest of us experience totally, and his life, as
Speaker 2: much as he's experienced so much, has been so incredibly
Speaker 2: sheltered at the same time, like he's lived in this
Speaker 2: little tiny bubble of a world and hasn't been exposed
Speaker 2: to all the different things that a normal person would
Speaker 2: be exposed to.
Speaker 1: So after his dad dies, Tiger decides to go and
Speaker 1: train with the Navy Seals. Like, I mean the hallmark
Speaker 1: of like the.
Speaker 2: Will having a life criss is and going to join
Speaker 2: the military.
Speaker 1: Like you have all the money in the world, you're
Speaker 1: a top athlete, you careen out of control and you're like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to the Navy Seals to be put through
Speaker 1: the ring, and they did. He one day on the
Speaker 1: golf course tells his caddie, Steve Williams. He's like, that's it.
Speaker 1: I'm quitting golf and joining the Navy Seals. So he
Speaker 1: was going to give up his career, his entire career,
Speaker 1: and go and join the Navy Seals. Like, this is
Speaker 1: a man that wasn't thinking straight.
Speaker 2: Okay, So at this point Tiger has joined the military
Speaker 2: and the wheels are well and truly falling off the
Speaker 2: bandwagon and he is in a full blown, swinging midlife crisis. Now,
Speaker 2: I know that the story gets progressively worse from here,
Speaker 2: But what happens next?
Speaker 1: All right? Two thousand and nine is when shit hits
Speaker 1: the absolute fan. So we start by seeing the National
Speaker 1: Inquirer publish a story front page that alleges that Woods
Speaker 1: had an affair with New Yorker Rachel Yucatel. We learned
Speaker 1: that Tiger had many mistresses, he cheated many many times,
Speaker 1: but she, unfortunately for her, became the absolute face of cheating.
Speaker 1: She was the pin up girl of the cheating scandal. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: she was a babe. She was managing a nightclub that
Speaker 1: he frequented a lot. Now, he went there with a
Speaker 1: lot of other athletes, but she used to run the club,
Speaker 1: so she her job was to make sure that when
Speaker 1: these people came, when these athletes came, they had the
Speaker 1: best night of their life. She obviously took that too
Speaker 1: seriously because she went home with him and she's like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to give you the best night of your life.
Speaker 1: But that is how they met, and that is how
Speaker 1: their love of started. And I called it a love
Speaker 1: affair because it went on for a very long time,
Speaker 1: and they said they were in love with each other.
Speaker 1: She was utterly obsessed and in love with him.
Speaker 2: But I guess the thing with this is, obviously Rachel
Speaker 2: knew the Tiger Woods was married and that he had
Speaker 2: two kids and a lovely wife at home, but she
Speaker 2: probably had no idea the depths of his deception as
Speaker 2: well the fact that he had many mistresses and she
Speaker 2: was also one of many. She probably felt like she
Speaker 2: was the chosen one and she was the only person
Speaker 2: that he had these extramarital affairs with.
Speaker 1: Later on, when it did all unravel, a lot of
Speaker 1: women came out thinking that they were in love and
Speaker 1: they were the chosen one, as you just said. But
Speaker 1: it unraveled in Australia. So the National Inquirer had a
Speaker 1: bit of an inkling close to home. Yeah, well, they
Speaker 1: had a bit of an inkling something was going on,
Speaker 1: and he was playing a tournament here in Australia, and
Speaker 1: he had called Rachel and said, I can't be there
Speaker 1: without you, I can't win without you. They obviously had
Speaker 1: this very strong bond, so he flew her to Australia
Speaker 1: led the Tennaspy City just turned to learning about one Man,
Speaker 1: Thank You, and that is where there were photographs of them.
Speaker 1: That's where it was released, and that's where everything went down.
Speaker 1: So where is Elin while all this is happening. Elin
Speaker 1: was at home with the kids because she's got two
Speaker 1: little kids, and obviously you trust your husband to be
Speaker 1: able to go and do his sport on the other
Speaker 1: side of the world without having an affair, without flying
Speaker 1: in his mistress Publicly, they Tiger and Rachel, they say
Speaker 1: they thought they got away with it because it was
Speaker 1: like trashy mag No one's looking into it privately. Elan's
Speaker 1: obviously clocked this and it hasn't felt right with it
Speaker 1: because she does some investigating herself. And two days later
Speaker 1: is when it all unravels. Two days later is Thanksgiving.
Speaker 1: It's two thousand and nine, and Tiger ends up having
Speaker 1: a very famous now single vehicle car accident outside his
Speaker 1: mansion in Florida.
Speaker 2: I remember that when this all imploded and the articles
Speaker 2: all came out, and it was like just the most
Speaker 2: insane unraveling which all sort of was like all centered
Speaker 2: around this car crash.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so he had a black escalade and he crashed
Speaker 1: into a fire hydrant and then the fire hydrants sort
Speaker 1: of like careened him into a tree. There are some
Speaker 1: stories from the tabloids that say Elin had chased him
Speaker 1: down the street she had found out he cheated and
Speaker 1: she was like smashing his car with his golf club
Speaker 1: and that that had caused the crash. But then they
Speaker 1: had said, well, no, that's not true. She was actually
Speaker 1: saving him and she had he had crashed and she
Speaker 1: had to smash the window to help get him out.
Speaker 2: Okay, there's a few parts of this that don't add up. Firstly,
Speaker 2: and this is like where the detective work comes in.
Speaker 2: If he had had a crash, why would you go
Speaker 2: smashing the back window to drag someone who's one hundred
Speaker 2: kilos out the back window?
Speaker 1: Well, plain that to me. I mean there were smashes everywhere.
Speaker 1: But this is the thing, none of it really makes sense.
Speaker 1: I mean, like I don't even want to speculate when
Speaker 1: I'm going to I reckon she cracked it. I don't
Speaker 1: think she was trying to save him. I think I
Speaker 1: think she cracked it and she was mad as you
Speaker 1: fucking would like, well, do you want to know why.
Speaker 1: Let's rewind a couple of hours to how Rachel tells
Speaker 1: us it went down, the reasons why she cracked it.
Speaker 1: It's Thanksgiving. They're in their home now. After this, Enquirer
Speaker 1: came out saying that Tiger had had this affair this
Speaker 1: front page. This was only two days prior. So Tiger
Speaker 1: had orchestrated a chat between Rachel and Elin, his mistress
Speaker 1: and his wife, so that Rachel could explain that nothing
Speaker 1: was going on, how they knew each other, why she
Speaker 1: was in Australia. It was all this big story that
Speaker 1: was ready. They had their chat for half an hour
Speaker 1: and this is all being told by Rachel the mistress.
Speaker 2: Mike. This is like a cover up, Like Tiger has
Speaker 2: gone to the effort of trying to create a cover
Speaker 2: up and get his mistress on board to deny that
Speaker 2: it's ever happened.
Speaker 1: Of course, and she does stand it, so she does.
Speaker 1: They think they get away with it. It's late at night,
Speaker 1: they're going to bed. Tiger takes sleeping tablets to go
Speaker 1: to bed, so this is quite widely known. He doesn't
Speaker 1: sleep without them. So he texts Rachel and says, thank you,
Speaker 1: I'm taking my sleeping tablets now and I'm going to bed.
Speaker 1: They say goodnight. Then Rachel gets a text message from
Speaker 1: Tiger after his said goodnight that says when while I
Speaker 1: see you again. Then a call from Tiger, so she
Speaker 1: answers it and she says, Babe, I thought you were
Speaker 1: going to bed, And there's a woman on the other
Speaker 1: end that is Elin, that says I knew it was you.
Speaker 1: For some reason, I do feel really sorry for Rachel
Speaker 1: as well, because I feel like she got sucked into
Speaker 1: a world that she didn't have any understanding of how
Speaker 1: deep it was going to be. And you can tell
Speaker 1: that she genuinely she knew she did the wrong thing,
Speaker 1: but she genuinely loved him. But in that moment, I
Speaker 1: just feel sorry for everyone. Like imagine being Elin calling
Speaker 1: and hearing her voice on the other end, Hey, babe,
Speaker 1: but you're going to say after you've just talked for
Speaker 1: half an hour, and she's like, nothing's going wrong.
Speaker 2: I just I also remember just how badly both of
Speaker 2: these women were painted in the media, like how negative
Speaker 2: and how nasty. Some of the commentary and the articles
Speaker 2: were like Elin who Obviously it's speculation whether or she
Speaker 2: did or she didn't smash this card to pieces, but
Speaker 2: there is this article that was written in The Mirror,
Speaker 2: and it paints her like she's absolutely hysterical, crazy, and
Speaker 2: like you would be crazy if you had just discovered
Speaker 2: text or just discovered that your whole life, everything that
Speaker 2: you believe your partner wasn't true, and that they were
Speaker 2: having an affair, and like, sure, maybe you wouldn't necessarily
Speaker 2: grab a golf club and smash in his back windows,
Speaker 2: but we don't even know if that actually happened. And
Speaker 2: the Mirror wrote this article that was like step by
Speaker 2: step detail around how she turned into a lunatic when
Speaker 2: she found out this information, and it's all speculation. Looking
Speaker 2: back in history, anytime any situation remotely has come forward
Speaker 2: like this, it's always the women that are attacked in
Speaker 2: the media. And at the end of the day, Tiger
Speaker 2: was having the affair. He was making Rachel feel like
Speaker 2: she was the one and something really special. For a
Speaker 2: very long time, he was cheating on his wife. But
Speaker 2: no one targeted Tiger quite like they targeted the two
Speaker 2: women in this story, which is really sad to see.
Speaker 2: I mean, he did have a very spectacular fall from
Speaker 2: grace as much as the women got embroad. It's like,
Speaker 2: you know, Rachel became the temptress and Elian became the
Speaker 2: hysterical wife. Like there was like the caricatures that were
Speaker 2: painted of both of them. Tiger just became a bit pathetic.
Speaker 1: After it all. Well, this is when the story came out,
Speaker 1: so everyone knew that he'd had an affair, and this
Speaker 1: is when everyone else came out of the woodwork. So
Speaker 1: there was another published article. US Weekly published it. A
Speaker 1: woman named Jamie Grubbs. She was a cocktail waitress. She
Speaker 1: came forward and was like, yo, I've had a thirty
Speaker 1: one month affair with Tiger too. So she had text
Speaker 1: messages and voicemails and like it started to it started
Speaker 1: to be like, you can't hire this anymore. You have
Speaker 1: to accept, you have to own it, because there's no running.
Speaker 2: These women would have been coming out because they would
Speaker 2: have felt betrayed, like so many of them would have
Speaker 2: felt like, especially if you've had a thirty one month
Speaker 2: affair with someone Tiger would have made three years. But
Speaker 2: Tiger would have made her feel like she was the
Speaker 2: only one. And I'm sure he was saying, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: my marriage with Elen, like you know, I can't leave.
Speaker 2: We've got two kids, it's on the rocks. It's so terrible.
Speaker 1: Blah blah blah blahla.
Speaker 2: Poor Aleen thinks that like everything is great, but like
Speaker 2: he would have been saying those lies to each one
Speaker 2: of his mistresses, So when it all unfolded and came out,
Speaker 2: they would have been angry because they would have felt
Speaker 2: lied to.
Speaker 1: And that's why they've also gone to the media. The
Speaker 1: people that came out after that, like he very much diversified.
Speaker 1: There was a porn star, a pancake house waitress, a
Speaker 1: Las Vegas club promoter. Yeah, he didn't stay in one lane.
Speaker 1: He was like a bit of years had once. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's like you get a Tiger, and you get a Tiger.
Speaker 1: He just like gave himself out like thought he was Oprah.
Speaker 2: But isn't this interesting going back to this whole like
Speaker 2: and what we spoke about at the very beginning, how
Speaker 2: he was so great at compartmentalizing, how he had one
Speaker 2: life that was like his public media personal family life
Speaker 2: that everyone thought he was just the most incredible, like
Speaker 2: family man, he was so successful. And then on the
Speaker 2: flip side, he had this, he had this like very
Speaker 2: dark underbelly that all became exposed.
Speaker 1: I want to know how he met the pancake house waitress.
Speaker 1: I didn't think an athlete had being in pancake probably
Speaker 1: on a Saturday morning after a few once. Well, anyway,
Speaker 1: one hundred plus women come forward apparently to say that
Speaker 1: they had had an affair, and I think they just
Speaker 1: stopped counting at that. I think they get to one
Speaker 1: hundred and they're eight. Let's just just do one hundred plus,
Speaker 1: like just the plus in at the end. Well, in
Speaker 1: twenty ten, he apologizes on national television in front of
Speaker 1: family and friends, and he announces that he is going
Speaker 1: to be leaving golf for a little while to focus
Speaker 1: and try and save his marriage, which spoiler doesn't work. Actually,
Speaker 1: can we get some sob story music here? Someone, if
Speaker 1: there's anyone around that could just pop that in.
Speaker 2: I have Tiger's apology right here or handy on final
Speaker 2: I wonder if he got his mum to write this one.
Speaker 1: Probably yeah, I know my actions were wrong, but I
Speaker 1: convinced myself that normal rules didn't apply. I never thought
Speaker 1: about who I was hurting. Instead, I thought only about myself.
Speaker 1: I ran straight through the boundaries that a married couple
Speaker 1: should live by. I thought I could get away with
Speaker 1: whatever I wanted to. I felt that I had worked
Speaker 1: hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the
Speaker 1: temptations around me. I felt I was entitled thanks to
Speaker 1: money and fame. I didn't have to go far to
Speaker 1: find them. I was wrong. I was foolish. I don't
Speaker 1: get to play by different rules. It's a good apology,
Speaker 1: it's he owned it, for sure, but the fact that
Speaker 1: he's like literally saying, yeah, I felt like I was god.
Speaker 1: I felt like I deserved it. I worked so hard
Speaker 1: I get to do whatever I want, And like, for sure,
Speaker 1: you probably did do it before you get married, But
Speaker 1: this is my thing. I'm like, you could have. You
Speaker 1: could have played around as much as you wanted before
Speaker 1: you got married. But I guess you know.
Speaker 2: And this is absolutely not making excuses for the behavior.
Speaker 2: But I think with the context around how he was raised,
Speaker 2: with the context around how and what he was exposed
Speaker 2: to from his own parents, as in from his dad
Speaker 2: and from the person who was his mentor. I just
Speaker 2: think that, like, his world is a world that we
Speaker 2: can't relate to, and his world and what he was
Speaker 2: exposed to is so hugely and vastly different that it
Speaker 2: also makes you makes you look at the circumstances and
Speaker 2: go Not that I condone it, but I understand why
Speaker 2: he cheated and why he acted the way he acted
Speaker 2: because the guy had some like very very flawed upbringings,
Speaker 2: and he had some hugely flawed ideal ideologies around relationships.
Speaker 2: He thought they didn't the rules don't apply to him
Speaker 2: because they've never applied to him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the real person that was heard here obviously
Speaker 1: is Elin. She'd stood by her husband for a long time,
Speaker 1: but it was what happened to her in the aftermath.
Speaker 1: And Tiger's friends come out to say, like he could compartmentalize,
Speaker 1: like we spoke about earlier, this hypnotizing on the course,
Speaker 1: he could compuntmentalize his life like no one else could,
Speaker 1: so he had a double life. Elin had only just
Speaker 1: found this out, so she thought the Tiger she got
Speaker 1: was this incredible athlete, an incredibly loving husband, an amazing father,
Speaker 1: that was just so obsessed with his kids, and she
Speaker 1: thought that's what it was, and she got Jekyll and Hyde.
Speaker 1: There was a party animal that went to Vegas constantly
Speaker 1: with other athletes, up to one hundred and twenty women.
Speaker 1: Is reported that he cheated on her with was partying,
Speaker 1: was doing cocktails of drugs, like literally two different people.
Speaker 1: And she's only just finding this out. And then on
Speaker 1: top of that, what happened to her after the harassment
Speaker 1: that she received from the media and the paparazzi, and
Speaker 1: this footage of her trying to walk down the street
Speaker 1: with her kids and journalists and paparazzi are yelling out
Speaker 1: to her, have you had an STD check yet? Have
Speaker 1: you had an STND check yet? But just the audacity
Speaker 1: of the abuse that she received after she was already
Speaker 1: going through a heartbreak, I just can't even fathom.
Speaker 2: And it's also the shaming, you know, it's like she
Speaker 2: had no knowledge and she had no input in this,
Speaker 2: in his wrongdoing, but it's the shaming of her. And
Speaker 2: like like we said earlier, this like making her look
Speaker 2: like she was hysterical, making her look like she was
Speaker 2: unhinged because of the separation and because of what he'd done,
Speaker 2: and it's so unfair to judge her actions based on
Speaker 2: his actions and her reaction based on his actions.
Speaker 1: Well, look, if anything is going to make it better,
Speaker 1: it's the approximate one hundred million dollars I repeat, one
Speaker 1: hundred million dollars that she got in the divorce settlement.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, how much is
Speaker 1: enough to lose your entire family? Like, yes, she got
Speaker 1: one hundred million dollars, but everything she knew and loved
Speaker 1: completely fell apart, and she lost what she thought was
Speaker 1: her happy ever after.
Speaker 2: I wonder, like, I mean, that would play on your
Speaker 2: mind so much. You would never be able as much
Speaker 2: as he's meant to be this king of compartmentalizing, you
Speaker 2: would never be able. I don't think anybody could compartmentalize
Speaker 2: those two worlds.
Speaker 1: Once they'd unraveled, there was a pretty tumultuous time for Tiger.
Speaker 1: He was very, very up and down. They ended up,
Speaker 1: and now Elan says they they ended up becoming friends.
Speaker 1: They're quite close again, they're not together. Elan has now
Speaker 1: had another baby with this really really like super hot,
Speaker 1: definitely my type hot footballer. I'm married football and the Yeah,
Speaker 1: they've had a little baby, and she's she's really happy,
Speaker 1: and she says that they do have a really good
Speaker 1: relationship now because at the end of the day, she's like,
Speaker 1: was he a good husband to me? No, he did
Speaker 1: the wrong thing, but he's a very good father. So
Speaker 1: they co parent very very well.
Speaker 2: It takes such an incredibly strong woman to be to
Speaker 2: be betrayed the way that she was betrayed and then
Speaker 2: to go on and amicably and in a friendly, kind
Speaker 2: way co parent with that other person, because you would
Speaker 2: they'd be a part of you that would be like,
Speaker 2: I don't ever want someone like you around my children.
Speaker 2: I don't want you as a role model around my children.
Speaker 1: But not only did Elin find her happiness, Tiger has
Speaker 1: been in a relationship for around three years now and
Speaker 1: he's very very happy, and they're all very happy in
Speaker 1: terms of interacting together. Elan is really happy with Tiger's
Speaker 1: new partner. Tiger's kids really loved Tiger's new partner. So
Speaker 1: I feel like whilst it was a pretty hectic journey,
Speaker 1: they all got there in the end, so we all
Speaker 1: love to see a happy ending. So that is a
Speaker 1: story of Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren and the pancake waitress,
Speaker 1: the infidelity, the car crashes like that is the story,
Speaker 1: the tumultuous story that at the end has a happy ending.
Speaker 1: But I hope you learned something. I'm Britt and I'm
Speaker 1: Laura and this is Hooked, Hitched and Hung Up, a
Speaker 1: podcast from iHeart Podcast Australia, dead Set Studios and a
Speaker 1: Kiss Network.
Speaker 2: Make sure you're follow in your podcast at because there
Speaker 2: are some really interesting relationship stories coming your way soon.
Speaker 2: And if you haven't listened to the episode before, there's
Speaker 2: a go back and catch up because your girls did
Speaker 2: some great research here and we are talking about Monica
Speaker 2: Lewinsky and the President of the United States and that
Speaker 2: gap dress that you know should have been put in
Speaker 2: a bin. Men Mountain, Jason Moer and how him married
Speaker 2: his childhood TV crash.
Speaker 1: See you next time for some more breakups and makeups
Speaker 1: and sex and romance.