"Shooting for Tiger" Takes Golfers for a Round With Golf's Next Stars

Author William Echikson’s access and perspective gives an insider’s look into the global future of the game. The attached is excerpted from a Press Release introducing the new book.

NEW YORK: When a phenomenon hits the world stage of sports (be it baseball, hockey, football, basketball, tennis or golf) and enjoys sustained success, that person’s name immediately becomes the subject of a benchmark question as his or her career starts to wane.

Who’s next? 

Who will be the next one to capture our attention and imagination? And where will that star emerge from…?

“Who will be the next… Jordan, Gretzky, Payton, Magic, Sampras, or Tiger?”

With this week's The Players Championship, the Tour's signature event featuring one of the strongest fields in golf and a $9.5 million purse, looming on the horizon, golf may be ready to unveil the heir apparent to Tiger.

The course has caused Woods to pull his hair from his head for most of this decade. Woods won TPC in 2001, as well as the U.S. Amateur there in 1994. He has not recorded so much as a top-10 finish in six appearances and has nine sub-par rounds in his last 24 trips to the course.

“Shooting For Tiger: How Golf’s Obsessed New Generation Is Transforming a Country Club Sport” (Public Affairs, Perseus Book Groups, April 2009) by William Echikson takes a good look at that question in the world of golf, as marketers, fans, and networks look to where golf’s next stars will come from and who they may be.

Echikson followed the junior golf circuit of the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA); its young players striving to become the next Tiger…or Tigress; the pressures endured as individuals try to live up to real and perceived expectations; visions of grandeur and life as a potential future professional; the mental toll of these ambitions; the fall; and realization that someone is “younger, better, and more talented.”

Echikson, a three-time author, former staff correspondent to the Wall Street Journal, FORTUNE, and BusinessWeek, as well as Brussels bureau chief of the Dow Jones Newswires, and currently director of European Union communications for Google, embarked on the journey of junior golf with his son, Samuel.

Along the way, he gained unfettered access to some of the most gifted young golfers in the world (and their parents) to portray a fascinating look into minds of teen-age athletes who face the challenges of the golf course, their wandering psyches, and the potential for an economic windfall that could sustain them for the rest of their lives.

Seventeen-year-old Vicky Hurst (Melbourne, Fla.) is one of the rising stars profiled in “Shooting For Tiger.”

Dubbed “the female Tiger,” Hurst is a 2006 Junior All-American, ranked No. 2 on the Polo girls ranking of all American junior girl golfers, and a legitimate candidate for Player of the Year.

Hurst, along with Courtney Ellenboggen (Blacksburg, Va.), Kristen Park (Buena Park,  Calif.), Jane Rah (Torrance, Calif.), and others represent a new breed of female golfers who are turning professional in their teen-age years with high-powered games that are rejuvenating the once-sleepy Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) Tour.

Along with Echikson’s son, Samuel, the author also follows in the footsteps of numerous prominent boys including Peter Uihlein, a 17-year-old front-runner for Player of the Year honors and son of Titleist CEO Wally Uihlein.

Peter’s story delves into the psyche of playing as the favorite, the son of privilege and how he has not been able to always handle the pressure that comes along with those lofty expectations.

“Among junior golf connoisseurs, Uihlein’s history of cracking under pressure has generated whispers that he is a so-called ‘choke,’ a player who freezes up on the course,” writes Echikson.

Another familiar face dotting the pages of “Shooting For Tiger” is tennis legend and eight-time Grand Slam champion Ivan Lendl, whose daughters Marika and Isabelle compete in the AJGA events.

Lendl explains how his family splits time between homes in Connecticut and Bradenton, Fla. in order to keep his daughters on the golf course all year long. Other boys noted in the book are: Cameron Peck (Tacoma, Wash.), Cody Gribble (Highland Park, Texas) and Devlin Conrad (Montrose, Pa.).

“Shooting For Tiger” culminates with the following assessment from the author:

“The long junior golf journey across the United States, and for some, across the Atlantic Ocean, has witnessed teen-agers soar to victory and display impressive sportsmanship in one tournament, only to crumble in the subsequent event and descend into childish temper tantrums.

"Many parents have lived vicariously through their children’s moments of triumph and failure; others have provided impressive and moving moments of selfless support to help their children ride out their rockiest moments. No single method of parenting or training has emerged as a magic ticket to ensuring future success.”

“The boot camp academy approach has produced legions of standout players, but it is expensive and too young an institution to offer a conclusive track record. The method of homeschooling players to allow more dedicated golf time remains, at best, an experiment.

"The European socialist model, which relies on combing the countryside for the best players and enrolling them in rigorous training programs, is hard to imagine on American turf. The Korean method, which leans heavily on parents to play a steadfast role as coach and encourager, isn’t easily replicable.”

“If teenagers want to succeed, in golf or any other athletic or artistic passion, they must practice and compete.

"Studies show that many stressed teenagers, under pressure to perform, risk tumbling into severe depression, while talented offspring of more laid-back, encouraging parents are more likely to be able to enjoy and excel at their passion.

"In junior golf, it’s often difficult to discern whether parents or children take the lead.”

“For the most part, the junior golfers on the green are too young to ask tough questions about their passion. They just go out and play. ‘I just love golf,’ is the only answer Alexis Thompson offers when I asked her about her choice to dedicate herself to this tough sport.”

“Shooting For Tiger: How Golf’s Obsessed New Generation Is Transforming a Country Club Sport” is available in all major bookstores, as well as Amazon.com.