Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Adam Schupak

Golf Channel to air never-before-broadcast footage of 6-year-old Tiger Woods on Monday

How good was Tiger Woods’ swing when he was 6 years old?

Rare footage of a nine-hole exhibition match from December 30, 1981 – his sixth birthday – shows the brilliance of the child prodigy. The footage, recently discovered by the Golf Channel, will air for the first time on Monday’s 7 p.m. ET edition of Golf Central Live From The Masters.

The feature includes interviews with Woods’ childhood coach, Rudy Duran, and his opponent that day, 12-year-old Michele Lyford-Sine, who also went on to attend Stanford and compete on the golf team.

“I was nervous,” Lyford-Sine told the Redlands Community News in 2019. “I couldn’t let this 6-year-old beat me. I was twice as old as he was and he was half my size.”

In the end, she rose to the occasion, shooting 41 on the front nine of the par-35 Redlands Country Club in Redlands, California, to beat Woods, who shot 51. She got to eat cake, too.

“I remember,” said Lyford-Sine, “we sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to him and he blew out candles on a cake inside the restaurant at Redlands Country Club.”

Click here to watch a preview of the feature.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.