Amazing comeback
The lover who tamed Tiger Woods
After Tiger Woods made one of the biggest comebacks in sporting history, the golfing legend walked off the green and straight into the arms of his new love Erica Herman.
And those close to Tiger – who clinched the US Masters last week after not winning a major title in 10 years – say the “calming” effect of Erica, 33, has made all the difference.
“They’ve been together for two years and despite his problems, Erica has stood by him all the way,” dishes one of the 43-year-old sporting legend’s friends. “They get on incredibly well and she is not put off by his past troubles with women.”
Tiger was the world’s highestpaid athlete between 1997 and 2008, winning 14 majors and amassing a fortune of more than $2 billion. But his world came crashing down in 2009, when his then-wife Elin Nordegren confronted him over a text he sent a nightclub hostess, which said, “You are the only one I’ve ever loved.”
Despite having taken a sleeping pill, the father-of-two sped off in
his car and hit a tree – and Elin, 39, reportedly smashed the SUV’s back windows with a golf club. After Tiger’s extra-marital affair was revealed, dozens more women emerged with sordid stories of sleeping with the star and within months, he lost not only his marriage but most of his sponsors.
Over the following eight years, he went from being the world’s number-one golfer to placed just 1199th and two years ago, after an operation on his back, he was found slumped at the wheel of his Mercedes with the engine running, two blown tyres and a cocktail of painkillers coursing through his veins.
Slowly, however, the golfer began his comeback, helped by Erica, who he met when she was hired to be the general manager of his pop-up restaurant The Woods Jupiter.
These days, Tiger shares custody of daughter Sam, 11, and son Charlie, 10, with Elin, but his pal says, “He still thinks about his sex scandal every day. It’s painful to him, but he persevered and made himself into a better man.”