The clubs Tiger Woods used for his 1997 Masters win that shook the world

Nick Faldo hands Tiger Woods the Masters Green Jacket
Nick Faldo hands Tiger Woods the Green Jacket

Tiger Woods’ performance at Augusta in 1997 remains the most seismic victory in the modern era.

Coming into Masters week, the 21-year-old was ranked the 13th best player in the world.

At the end of it he would claim what is still the tournament’s largest margin of victory – an astonishing 12-shot success despite playing his first nine holes in four over par.

On that opening day, Woods famously came back in six-under 30 to shoot 70 before he added efforts of 66-65 and a closing 69 to leave the field trailing in his wake.

An estimated 44 million viewers watched it unfold.

Bizarrely, Woods would have to wait until June to claim the No. 1 spot in the world rankings.

Tiger recorded two eagles, 21 birdies, 42 pars and seven bogeys over the four rounds. He played the par 5s in 13-under and, in the years to come, his dismantling of Augusta National would lead to a ‘Tiger-proofing’ of the course.

Woods now has five Green Jackets.

So, what was in the bag when Tiger shook the world?

Driver: King Cobra Deep Face 9˚
It is often thought that Woods had the Titleist 975D driver in the bag for his iconic win but he actually had this Cobra model. Woods was phenomenal off the tee in terms of distance, averaging something like 25 yards further than the next longest. He would switch to the Titleist the following year.

Tiger Woods drives at the 1997 Masters

3-wood: Titleist PT 15 15˚
Woods only had one fairway wood in the bag and it’s hard to remember him using this very much given his length off the tee and shortish irons into the par 5s. One club you will never see in Woods’ bag is a hybrid, a club he has spoken about with some disdain.

Irons: Mizuno MP-29 (2-4), MP-14 (5-PW)
Blended iron sets are commonplace these days but less so back in the 90s. Here there were subtle offset differences as the irons went up in number, so less in the MP-29 which he relied on for the long irons and then similar in the MP-14 which he used from the 5 to pitching wedge. Needless to say, given they are Mizunos, both looked spectacular.

For Woods, the MP-29 provided less offset in the long irons than the MP-14 and vice versa in the mid and short irons. To get the perfect amount of offset, Woods split the set in half, using MP-29 in the 2- through 4-iron and MP-14 in the 5-iron through pitching wedge

Wedges: Cleveland 588 RTG (56˚ and 60˚)
Cleveland excel at making wedges and these were no exception and a hugely popular choice back in the 90s. Interestingly there seems a huge gap between his pitching and 56˚ wedges and there was no gap wedge in the bag back then.

Putter: Scotty Cameron Newport TeI3
Again it’s often thought that Woods had the world-famous Newport 2 GSS for this win but it was actually a different Scotty Cameron. The now 15-time Major champion was using a Newport TeI3 which had a soft Terrylium insert that was held in place by five screws positioned in the back cavity. To hide the screws Woods had 32 vibration-dampening dots installed to give him the sound and feel that he was after. He used the Newport 2 for the 2001 Masters win and it’s still in the bag now.

Ball: Titleist Professional 90
We had to wait until October 2000 for the release of the Pro V1 so Woods had this wound ball which, you would imagine, he changed every few holes. Great for soft feel and high spin it excelled around the greens. Woods switched to a Nike ball when he signed with them five years later.

Note: Tiger had True Temper Dynamic Gold X100 shafts in all woods and irons.

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