Tiger Woods no longer swinging Nike golf clubs

Tiger Woods will return to the PGA Tour this week as a member of the TaylorMade stable after announcing on Wednesday that he had made the switch after years of using Nike equipment.

"After several months of testing and all brands to choose from, the choice is clearly @TaylorMadeGolf. Proud to join the family!” Woods wrote on his twitter account.

The American, who won his 14 major titles endorsing Nike, was forced to switch when the sportswear and equipment giant decided to get out of the hard goods part of the golf business.

While Woods will be swinging new clubs, he will continue to wear Nike's familiar swoosh on his golfing apparel

Both Nike and Adidas decided last year to review their golf business, with the German sporting goods giant opting to sell the bulk of a division that was losing money. Nike's golf problems were more than financial. Besides the game's sharp decline in popularity after 2000, initially powered by Wood's long winning streak, no Nike-sponsored golfer has won a major golf tournament in the last eight championships, according to ESPN.

Sidelined by back pain for the past 15 months, Woods launches his official comeback on Thursday at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines in southern California, an event he has won seven times.

Woods also captured the 2008 U.S. Open there on one of his favourite layouts.

He joins a TaylorMade team that includes Australian world number one Jason Day and American U.S. Open champion Dustin Johnson.

The 41-year-old American has not played an official money event since Aug. 2015 and pulled out of a planned return at the first tournament of the 2016-17 season in northern California in October.

He said then that his game was not ready but subsequently made his comeback at the Hero World Challenge, an unofficial PGA Tour event, in the Bahamas in December where he finished 15th in an 18-man field.