On the trail of the Tiger cub

William Johnson talks to Claude Harmon who saw Woods up close.

The son of the legendary golf coach Butch Harmon, Claude Harmon III is the director of The Butch Harmon School of Golf based at The Els Club in Dubai Sports City.

Claude Harmon witnessed at first hand the careful process that helped turn Tiger Woods from one of the most exciting amateurs the United States had produced into the man who would go on to become the best golfer the world has ever seen. Harmon, 39, son of the famous golfing guru Butch Harmon who is now establishing himself in a similar capacity in the UAE, was an enthusiastic helper at his father's academy when the teenaged Woods walked in asking for guidance.

It was in 1993 at the time Butch was working closely with Greg Norman who had won the British Open at Royal St George's earlier that year. Tiger arrived in his shorts, without any golf shoes and without a glove and Butch went to work. Claude, who used to operate the academy's video camera at the time, but is now the director of instruction at the new Ernie Els club in Dubai, takes up the story. "Tiger said to my dad 'I can't hit many fairways, but I hit the ball so much farther than anybody else. If you can show me how to hit fairways I feel I can make big improvements to my game'. My dad was keen to develop that raw talent.

"Tiger then just went through his array of shots and I could see my dad was impressed as I filmed those shots. Any time my dad has a young player, he asks him how he hits a certain shot. Every time Tiger was asked to hit a shot that he couldn't hit he would say so. "He would admit it if he was not capable of hitting it properly. He would then say that if you showed him how to do it he would do it and he always did it. There were no airs and graces and no bulls***. My dad asked him what his basic strategy was and the answer was simply to hit the ball as far as possible."

The junior Harmon knew in those early days of the Woods phenomenon that something magical was about to explode into an appreciative sporting world. He recalled: "My dad said to me 'if I could get hold of that kid I could make him into one of the best players of all time'. It was a bold statement to make. But he was at the right stage of his career to make that assessment. Golf changed when Tiger came along and my dad was in the right place at the right time."

Harmon jnr believes the world No 1, who is out of action at the moment recovering from knee surgery, does not get anything like the credit he deserves. "As good as people think Tiger is, he is so much better than that," he declared. "I think [Ben] Hogan, [Sam] Snead, [Walter] Hagan, etc would struggle in the modern day world with the technology and demands that are made on the top players' time. We are always harking back to the so-called glory years. But these are the glory years. We will never see another player like Tiger."

Claude, who is seven years older than his family academy's star pupil, developed a friendship with Woods as fame and fortune followed. "I remember asking him to give an impromptu lesson when he made a day trip to our school in 2000," said Harmon. "We were doing a session in Vegas for six customers. I was getting ready to give a demonstration about getting out of a fairway bunker and thought 'why not ask Tiger to show them instead?' I said to him 'you tell our guests how to hit a long bunker shot'. He did and walked away laughing.

"I asked him why he was laughing. At first he wouldn't tell me, but then he said 'I actually don't do any of that but if I told these players what I really do, it would mess them up'. That's the difference between playing and teaching, I suppose." @Email:[e-mail]