Tiger Woods says his mother, Kultida — a ‘force of nature' — has died at 78

Chicago Tribune

04-02-2025

Kultida Woods, the Thai-born mother of Tiger Woods who instilled his dominant spirit and encouraged him to wear a red shirt on Sundays as his power color, died Tuesday.
Woods announced the death of his 78-year-old mother in a social media post. He did not disclose a cause or other details. She was at his indoor TMRW Golf League match last week in South Florida, where she lived.
He described her as a 'force of nature' who was his biggest supporter from the time she drove him to junior golf tournaments in California to being there for his 15 major championships, often wearing her wide-brimmed visor and sunglasses.
'It is with heartfelt sadness that I want to share that my dear mother, Kultida Woods, passed away early this morning,' Woods wrote. 'My Mom was a force of nature all her own, her spirit was simply undeniable. She was quick with the needle and a laugh. She was my biggest fan, greatest supporter, without her none of my personal achievements would have been possible. She was loved by so many, but especially by her two grandchildren, Sam and Charlie.'
President Donald Trump was among those who reached out with a post on his Truth Social, calling her 'an amazing influence' on Woods.
Woods' father, Earl, died in 2006.
'Tida,' as many called her, was working as a civilian secretary in the U.S. Army office in Bangkok when she met Earl Woods, who was stationed there. She spoke minimal English when she married him and left Thailand for the first time in 1968, going first to Brooklyn and then to Cypress, Calif., where Tiger Woods was born in 1975.
His father taught him golf. His mother brought the discipline.
'Everyone thought it was my dad when I went on the road, which it was,' Woods said last year when he received the Bob Jones Award from the USGA. 'But Mom was at home. If you don't know, Mom has been there my entire life. She's always been there through thick and thin.
'She has allowed me to get here. She allowed me to do these things, chase my dreams, and the support and love — I didn't do this alone. I had the greatest rock that any child could possibly have: my mom.'
Passing along the Thai heritage of Woods was important to his mother. She took him to Thailand for the first time when Woods was 9, and he returned there to play three tournaments early in his career, winning each time.
What they shared was a fighting spirit.
'I am a loner, and so is Tiger,' she said in a 2009 interview in Thailand with Jaime Diaz of Golf Digest, a rare occasion when she spoke publicly.
'When I was a girl my mother would always be worried: 'What will people say?' And even then I would think, I don't give a damn. I always tell Tiger: 'You can't do things just to please other people. It will waste your energy, and you won't be happy in yourself. You have to do what is right for yourself.' And on that, he does a good job.'
Inside the ropes, his mother wanted to see domination, and she got every bit of that.
'And then, sportsmanship,' she once said.
She was the one responsible for him wearing a Sunday red shirt — Woods now has an apparel line named for that — because in Thai it was his power color.
'Mom thought being a Capricorn that my power color was red, so I wore red as a junior golfer and I won some tournaments,' Woods said at the launch last year of the Sun Day Red brand. 'I go to a university that is red — Stanford is red. We wore red on the final day of every single tournament, and then every single tournament I've played as a professional I've worn red. It's just become synonymous with me.'
She also had a tradition of giving Woods a new Tiger head cover for his driver each year. Stitched among the orange-and-black was written in Thai, 'Love from Mom.'
Tida moved out of the house where Woods grew up to something more modern in Orange County, and she followed him to South Florida after her husband died. She didn't get out to as many tournaments but rarely missed the Masters. She was there with her grandchildren when Woods captured his fifth green jacket and 15th major in 2019 at Augusta National.
She was there for a long time, and Woods never failed to cite her influence on his career. That started long ago, driving him to tournaments or dropping him off at the golf course with a dollar — 75 cents to buy a hot dog, 25 cents for the phone call to pick him up.
Woods said in a 2017 interview with USA Today that it was his mother's discipline he feared.
'My mom's still here and I'm still deathly afraid of her,' he said. 'She's a very tough, tough old lady, very demanding. … I love her so much, but she was tough.'