When Tiger Woods stands on the 18th green on Sunday, there are many factors to consider, such as the green speed, the type of grass, the wind, the slope and even the water content of the lawn below. But one thing he has been saying about his participation in the 138th British Open more than a year ago is the color and style of his jacket, pants and hat.
On the first round of Thursday, he will wear a dark blue striped shirt; a light coral on Friday; and a white striped shirt on Saturday. The highlight of the final day, his clothing will be a new red diamond pattern shirt with black pants.
Back in the summer of last year, sponsor Nike had designed Woods to wear every day of this year's Grand Slam. In fact, Nike held its first meeting 17 months ago to study what the world's No. 1 British Open at the 2009 Open, in order to ensure that its outlets will be able to put on Woods clothing this weekend. .
The same applies to almost any other top player. Perhaps no one can predict how many shots Garcia can play on Saturday, but his white pants and blue white piping tops are well known. It was designed for him by sponsor Adidas. Kenny - Perry will wear a dark blue plaid shirt and light khaki pants. US Open champion Lucas Glover's clothing is light yellow Nike jacket and gray pants.
As a personal sport, golfers do not need to wear uniform clothing, tend to have better advertising effects in style and color. In this regard, Adidas Golf's senior director, said: "If one of our sponsors win the title on Sunday afternoon, then he will increase the sales of clothes by 10%."
Although there is no specific organization to track the sales of golf apparel, it is estimated that golf equipment market is about 40-50 billion US dollars, while the apparel market at least with this. In the face of this big cake, all clothing brands want a piece of cake. So from the 80s of last century, golf began to appear for the top players in the four major championships to prepare clothing.
In addition to providing game clothing, sponsors give professional players out of the advertising costs also increased rapidly. Since signing the contract with Nike in 1996, the company has paid nearly $ 250 million to Woods. The contract involves more than clothing, Woods is still using the Nike Golf clubs and balls. In most public places, he is wearing this brand of clothes, even when advertising for other sponsors.
Most companies meet for about a year and a half before the event to design their apparel, choose styles, patterns and fabrics. Woods meets with his Nike clothing team three or four times a year, sees clothing and puts forward his point of view at the last meeting. The team chief said: "For example, the tiger does not wear white pants and does not wear green, and one year we prepared a dark green shirt for his third round of the PGA Championship, but he said the match It was Oklahoma in August, and he could not wear a dark shirt under such heat, so we removed that color from the scheme.
Of course, many professional players have their own insistence on clothing. For a long time, Mike - Weir only wear black shoes; Jin Hezhen will wear blue plaid pants on Friday; Justin - Leonard is more conservative, wearing pure black pants on Friday.
More famous example is that Woods always wear red on Sunday. In response to this habit, Nike is also trying to design more. "We tried different shades of red, such as more powder or partial dark purple; also with stripes and other patterns. We provide him with different options, and people all noticed when Woods wore a new style of red Shirt, it will be a big buy, because everyone wants to play like a tiger.