Tiger Woods once broke record after record, inspiring a generation of golfers who grew up watching and looking up to him. Tom Kim is one of those golfers. And on the morning of the most important and stressful round of Kim’s life, Woods showed that his influence extends far beyond his accomplishments on the golf course.
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Kim Joo-hyung, known worldwide as Tom Kim, woke up on October 3—the final day of the men’s golf event at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games—to a text from Tiger Woods. The message was seven words, but they carried enormous weight: “Just be you, nothing more, nothing less.”
Kim said the pressure to win had overwhelmed him, making Woods’ message arrive at exactly the right moment. He had prepared himself with the mindset that “if I just do what I should, good results will follow,” so he felt surprised to hear essentially the same advice from Woods. “It feels like Tiger is always watching me,” Kim said, laughing.
And then Kim went out and won gold. It was another defining moment in a career shaped by remarkable achievements from a young age. Kim burst onto the PGA Tour in 2022, winning twice as a teenager. A year later, he became the youngest player since Tiger Woods to win three PGA Tour titles. He has since added a fourth PGA Tour victory, most recently at the 2026 Genesis Scottish Open.
Then came the slump. After reaching No. 11, his highest, Kim’s ranking fell outside the top 150 this year. He cried after finishing eighth at the Paris Olympics, a far cry from the teenager who once seemed destined for greatness. Quietly, Kim was fighting his way back. The turning point came in June, when he finished third at the U.S. Open, a major championship. Just a month later, he completed his comeback in dramatic fashion, winning the Genesis Scottish Open for his first PGA Tour title in nearly two years and nine months.
Fast-forward to Japan, where Kim was carrying his country’s hopes. The stakes were even higher because an Asian Games gold medal would earn him an exemption from military service. After his victory, Kim admitted that the pressure was far greater than anything he normally experiences on the PGA Tour, saying he felt nervous almost every moment from Thursday through Sunday.
Then came Woods’ seven simple words. Having spent his career under enormous expectations, Woods knew exactly what Kim was going through—and what it takes to block out the noise and focus on the task at hand. Kim took that advice to heart. He stopped worrying about the pressure, trusted his preparation, and did exactly what Woods told him: be himself.
And Kim delivered when it mattered most. He fired a final-round 6-under 64 to finish at 18-under and win the gold medal by three strokes. The victory brought overwhelming relief. Kim described it as finally taking the weight off his shoulders, comparing the feeling to removing heavy buckets of water from his golf bag.
For the first time in a long time, Kim felt he could finally sleep peacefully. The gold medal gave him more than a title—it gave him relief, a weight lifted from his shoulders, and perhaps, most importantly, the freedom to move forward without carrying the same burden that had followed him for so long.