Tiger Woods splits with swing coach Sean Foley

For the first time in his career, Tiger Woods will be splitting ways with a swing coach before they ever won a single major championship.

Woods announced on Monday that he and swing coach Sean Foley, whom he began working with four years, are going in a different direction, taking to his website to break the news that Woods will once again be looking for a new swing coach.

“I’d like to thank Sean for his help as my coach and for his friendship,” Woods said. “Sean is one of the outstanding coaches in golf today, and I know he will continue to be successful with the players working with him. With my next tournament not until my World Challenge event at Isleworth in Orlando, this is the right time to end our professional relationship.”

The relationship between Woods and Foley was an interesting one. Foley came on when Woods’ golf game was as down in the dumps as it ever was, and after struggling through 2011, saw Woods pick up three wins in 2012 and five in 2013 including PGA Tour Player of the Year.

It was the majors that continued to be a problem for Tiger, who had some good finishes at the big four, but was never really a factor late on a Sunday during his time with Foley. Critics across the golf landscape focused on the issues with Tiger’s golf swing, especially this season when Woods went down with multiple injuries and basically had to sit out most of ’14 because of different back problems.

The loudest of the criticism came from a former student of Foley, who said for Woods to “leave Foley on the range” as Tiger started his eventual missed cut showing at this year’s PGA Championship.

The question now turns to Tiger and his next move with a coach. Woods had plenty of success with Butch Harmon, who he worked with from 1993-2003, and won majors with Hank Haney at his service from ’04-10, but Woods has never seemed like the guy that would go back to someone, pride or otherwise.

The good news for Team Tiger and others is he has plenty of time to figure it out, as he isn’t scheduled to really play golf until the 2015 season.

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Shane Bacon is the editor of Devil Ball Golf and Busted Racquet on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shanebaconblogs@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter at @ShaneBacon!

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