By Steve Roberts 

Contact lenses for sport  worn only while sleeping offer short-sighted professional and amateur golfers a great alternative treatment to laser surgery. Over the past ten years, a number of leading performers on the US and European professional golf tours - with Tiger Woods being the best known - have opted for Lasik surgical treatments to correct their short-sightedness rather than rely on conventional daytime contact lenses or glasses. Given that pollen, dust, wind and rain are all unhelpful but fairly frequent factors during the golfing season, it is hardly surprising that tour pros would want to leave their daytime contact lenses and glasses behind once Lasik treatments became available. Now however, overnight ortho-k corrective contact lenses offer short-sighted golfers a new non-surgical treatment which - like Lasik - results in clear, natural daytime vision.

When Tiger Woods transferred his success as a leading amateur golfer onto the professional stage in 1996, very few people knew that he was very short-sighted and utterly dependent on his daytime contact lenses. But his ambition to become the best golfer of all time was not compatible with the problems he encountered on the golf course as a daytime contact lens wearer so he paid a visit to Dr Mark Whitten, a leading ophthalmologist who has performed laser surgery on over 50 players from the pro PGA, LPGA and Seniors Tours. "He had what I call 'counting fingers vision,' " says Whitten. "He could only count my fingers a foot from his face." Since overnight ortho-k corrective contact lenses for sport  were not available at that time, Woods opted for Lasik treatment.

Woods' post-Lasik vision is 20/15 without corrective lenses and, coincidence or not, he won the first five tour events he played after having the surgery. Then he won four consecutive majors beginning with the U.S. Open in 2000. "I was apprehensive, just like anyone else would be when their vision is going to be altered," says Woods, who received $2 million to endorse the TLC Laser Eye Centers, "but I was prepared, because I researched everything and I had a lot of faith in Dr. Whitten." Woods says he's still as happy as ever with his vision and, most importantly, he was no longer at the mercy of pollen, dust, wind and rain. Now golfers good and bad can enjoy the benefits of clear, natural daytime vision without the apprehension associated with laser surgery by switching to overnight ortho-k corrective contact lenses for sport .

Check if you are suitable for overnight ortho-k corrective contact lenses  for sport.