His father was one of the most decorated teenage golfers to play the game. Now, Charlie Woods is adding to his own junior trophy cabinet.
The 14-year-old was part of the Benjamin School boys team that clinched the Florida High School Athletic Association Class A state championship on Wednesday, helping secure a fourth title for the Palm Beach school.
Freshman Woods carded rounds of 78 and 76 at Mission Inn Resort and Club in Howey-In-The-Hills, Florida, the fourth best score of his five-strong team, all while his father Tiger, clad in black, watched on.
He finished tied-26th in the individual rankings as the Benjamin School Buccaneers edged a one-shot victory.
The 47-year-old Woods had caddied for his son when he triumphed at his Junior National Golf Championship qualifier in Orlando in September, but had to settle for a spectator’s view this time around.
The 15-time major winner never lifted a state championship, though there is a caveat to his son’s bragging rights – his father never actually had the opportunity to win one. The California Interscholastic Federation did not stage the competition during Woods’ spell at Western High School in Anaheim, California.
Not that it put much of a dent in his résumé. As a 15-year-old student at the school in 1991, Woods became the then-youngest US Junior Amateur champion, and would go on to three-peat the event.
Within a year of turning professional in August 1996, he had won three PGA Tour events, become the youngest winner of The Masters at 21 and the fastest player to reach No. 1 in the world after turning pro.
Today, Woods sits at World No. 1307, a third-round withdrawal from The Masters in April being his last competitive appearance, and the most recent of the sporadic few he has made since suffering severe leg injuries in a serious car crash in 2021.
However, he is set to play in The TGL in January, a televised indoor golf league organized by TMRW Sports, a company Woods co-founded alongside Rory McIlroy.