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      At the U.S. Women’s Open, Jessica and Nelly Korda’s First Rounds Diverge

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      SAN FRANCISCO — Jessica and Nelly Korda often play practice rounds together but Thursday at the United States Women’s Open was the first time they had been in the same grouping for the first two rounds of a major tournament. The sisters and their parents were thrilled at the prospect of spending five-and-a-half hours together hiking the sloping labyrinth of a course that is the Olympic Club, the site of five U.S. men’s Opens, in the cool morning murk.It was one of those family gatherings that was a much better idea in theory than in practice.Starting on the ninth hole, Jessica, 28, birdied three of her first seven holes to share the early lead with Britain’s Mel Reid before the San Francisco Bay’s bedeviling winds upended her round.She carded a one-over-par 72, five strokes behind the pace-setting scores by Reid and Megha Ganne, a 17-year-old amateur from New Jersey, who were tied atop the field as other players were finishing their rounds. She spoke afterward as if she had survived a ride on a bucking bronco.Nelly Korda teeing off on the third hole.Michael Owens for The New York Times“I’m sore,” she said.Nelly, 22, the higher-ranked Korda and the top-ranked American at No. 4, seven spots better than her sister, opened with four pars. But three consecutive bogeys, starting at No. 13, were the start of her unraveling. She carded a seven-over-par 78 that was encapsulated by her troubles on her penultimate hole, the seventh.She had to hit her approach shot out of rough thicker than a camel’s eyelash while branches from a sapling fir tickled her face and neck. Her caddie, Jason McDede, asked the onlookers lining the right side of the hole several yards ahead of her to move back because, as he said, “We’re not sure where this is going.”Nelly, left, and Jessica talked while waiting to putt on the 11th.Michael Owens for The New York TimesThe crowd watching the shot after Jessica teed off on the 18th.Michael Owens for The New York TimesWith a compromised swing, Nelly was only able to advance the ball a few yards. Her next shot found a greenside bunker and she walked off the hole with her head down after a seven-shot triple bogey.After making a long putt to save par on her last hole, Nelly signed her scorecard and then left in a rush, stopping only to take selfies with a couple youngsters.“She’ll be fine,” said Jessica, whose heart ached as she watched her sister struggle. She did what she could to help. On the 12th and 14th holes, Jessica held up a hand to stop a man holding a fuzzy microphone who was walking into Nelly’s line of sight while she was standing over par putts.Jessica said: “Obviously I pay attention. It doesn’t matter who I play with, I don’t want anyone to play poorly. It’s tough to watch. You just know how it is. You’ve been in that position yourself. You don’t want anyone struggling with you or around you. So it’s never easy. At the same time, I have to play golf. You have to learn how to be slightly selfish.”Jessica, left, Nelly, and both their caddies sharing a laugh as they walked to their tee shots on the 11th hole.Michael Owens for The New York TimesThe sisters’ parents, Petr and Regina, carved out separate vantage points in the gallery, converging every so often to compare mental notes and commiserate. Pandemic-related restrictions limited the number of fans allowed on the course to less than 5,000. A few hundred of those followed the Kordas and the third player in their group, South Korea’s So Yeon Ryu, the 2011 champion, who posted a 74.Petr yelled encouragement, but as the round continued, his voice became harder to hear over the wind.“I think it’s kind of funny because I heard my dad, you can always hear my dad,” Jessica said. “He was telling Nelly, ‘Come on,’ and then like ‘Good birdie’ to me.”Jessica kept a few tees in her hair while playing.Michael Owens for The New York TimesThe sisters’ parents, Petr and Regina, looked on as Jessica putted.Michael Owens for The New York TimesShe added, “I think they’re just enjoying watching us out here and trying to strike the balance of being supportive and also uplifting.”The sisters’ parents made a beeline for the clubhouse as soon as the round was finished. Jessica and Nelly both have L.P.G.A. victories this year and they came into the week expecting to contend.“You try not to play yourself out of it,” Jessica said. “Obviously it was so frustrating, making some silly mistakes and then the wind switched and it got warmer so we were trying to figure out how everything was going.”She added: “I was throwing up grass and it was going one way and then another way so it was a little annoying. But you expect all of this at a U.S. Open.”Nelly reacted after hitting out of the sand bunker on the seventh hole, where she shot a triple bogey.Michael Owens for The New York Times More

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      Michelle Wie West Was Ready to Retire. Then She Got Mad.

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      A golf phenom since she was 10, Michelle Wie West was ready to focus on motherhood. Rudy Giuliani’s vulgar remarks convinced her that she should keep fighting and playing.SAN FRANCISCO — From a distance approximating one of her prodigious drives, Michelle Wie West caught a glimpse of her infant daughter in the arms of her mother, who was standing on a hotel balcony. It was Wie West’s first competitive tournament as a working mom, and at the sight of her child, whom she felt guilty about leaving, she burst into tears.“And then I hit in the water,” Wie West said with a laugh, recalling her “meltdown,” as she described it, during her opening nine-over-par 81 at the Kia Classic near San Diego in March.Wie West, 31, who is competing in the United States Women’s Open, which begins Thursday at the Olympic Club, has missed the cut in all three of her starts this season. The impenetrable focus that carried her to five L.P.G.A. titles, including the 2014 U.S. Open, has been diffused by marriage, motherhood and a motivation to deepen the conversation about, and commitment to, women in sports.Reams of copy have been written about Wie West since she became, at 10, the youngest player to qualify for the U.S. Women’s Public Links and announced her intentions to grow up to play on the L.P.G.A. and PGA Tours. She turned pro before her 16th birthday and contended deep into the final rounds of her first three L.P.G.A. major tournaments that first year, establishing a bar that proved hard to clear. She won her first tournament in 2009 at the age of 20, then three more before she won the U.S. Open at Pinehurst. But she has only won once since, the HSBC Women’s World Championship in 2018.And so, in 2019, Wie West could not have imagined herself here. Chronic wrist injuries precipitated a two-year layoff that she presumed would become permanent when she became pregnant a few months after her 2019 wedding to Jonnie West, the director of basketball operations for the N.B.A.’s Golden State Warriors. She told her husband that she was done playing.“I thought there was no chance of coming back,” said Wie West. She had opportunities to move into the broadcasting booth, and motherhood seemed like a natural pivot point.“But my husband was like, ‘No, no, just think it through,’” she said.When Wie West learned that she was having a daughter, her feelings about a comeback shifted for reasons she struggled to articulate. And then in February, a month before her official return, Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City, appeared on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast and asked if he could share a “funny story” about Rush Limbaugh, who had recently died.Giuliani recalled how Limbaugh had been perturbed by the photographers trailing them in a 2014 pro-am in which they were grouped with Wie West. Giuliani said that the “gorgeous” Wie West’s putting stance was attracting the photographers, who, he said, “were trying to take pictures of her panties.”Giuliani’s comments crystallized Wie West’s reasons for a comeback, irking her into action. After 25 years of speaking into a microphone as a matter of duty, Wie West realized that she actually had a lot to say, and a return to competition would give her the platform to address inequities and ignorance that she hadn’t been aware of as a teenage phenom.More affirmation came this week as she watched Naomi Osaka, another young nonwhite woman who is a star in a white-majority sport, quit the French Open rather than participate in news conferences she said were damaging to her mental health.“I thought what Naomi did this past week was incredibly brave,” said Wie West, who described her own experience with anxiety:“It’s tough, especially when you’re not doing well or there’s a lot more to life than your game. There could be other stuff happening. It is sometimes crippling at times, but I’m really proud of athletes taking charge of their mental health and making it a priority. More conversations need to be had about that.”Wie West is willing to wade into difficult conversations because she wants her daughter, Makenna Kamalei Yoona West, who will celebrate her first birthday on June 19, to grow up in a world where women athletes are seen and heard, and enjoy equal billing with men.In the past year she has revealed a different side of herself — as a leader in the drive for equity and change. With his words, Giuliani triggered Wie West’s election to the L.P.G.A. board of directors and her commitment to speak up more.“She texts me and calls me all the time,” said Heather Daly-Donofrio, a two-time tour winner who is now the L.P.G.A. chief communications and tour operations officer. “It’s great. I’ve had more conversations with her in the last two years than in her whole time on tour.”Wie West hits out of the bunker on No. 11 during the first round of the ANA Inspiration in February.Kelvin Kuo/USA Today Sports, via ReutersWie West has sought out other athletes who fought for change, including Renee Powell, one of the first African-American members of the L.P.G.A., and tennis icon Billie Jean King, who described how her threat to boycott the U.S. Open in 1973 as the defending women’s champion spurred the tournament to become the first of the Grand Slam events to pay men and women equally for their victories. Wie West has compared notes with W.N.B.A. standout and players’ association president, Nneka Ogwumike, whose undergraduate years at Stanford overlapped with hers.The conversations inspired Wie West to float the idea of forming an inter-sport council that could address the pay disparity and unequal resources between men’s and women’s sports.In 2019, the last full season before the coronavirus pandemic disrupted the playing calendar, 73 women’s players exceeded $50,000 in on-course earnings. That same season on the PGA Tour, the 73rd-highest earner made $1,553,149.The golfer who wins this Sunday will take home $1 million, from $5.5 million, the largest purse on the tour. The winner of the men’s U.S. Open at Torrey Pines this month will earn $2.25 million from a $12.5 million purse.Recently Wie West was reminded by her father-in-law, Jerry West, who works for the Los Angeles Clippers as a consultant, that the big money in men’s sports didn’t materialize overnight.West, the second overall pick in the 1960 draft, told her that he didn’t have an agent when he turned pro and for the duration of his first contract he held an off-season job in community relations for Great Western Savings to supplement his N.B.A. income. “He told me the N.B.A. was not something that they considered a full-time profession,” said Wie West. Like king tides, the wave that will lift all paychecks requires a perfect storm of leadership, talent, exposure, performances, marketing — to be aligned.With her 300-yard drives and fearless forays into men’s tournaments, a teenage Wie West was positioned as the game changer, the charismatic player who could take the L.P.G.A. Tour that Nancy Lopez popularized and deliver it, Tiger Woods-like, to a mainstream sports audience.Wie West was driving coverage of the women’s game before she was old enough to get behind the wheel of a car. So she was surprised when she stumbled onto the statistic recently that women are afforded roughly four percent of sports media coverage.Looking back, Wie West said, “I definitely can remember thinking, ‘Ugh, another interview. Stop talking about me.’”As a teenager, she was criticized by other golfers for hogging the spotlight, when in reality, she was attracting eyeballs that otherwise would have ignored women’s golf. Her visibility gained women’s golf new fans — and Wie West more critics. Dottie Pepper, a two-time major winner, described her in a 2007 essay published in Sports Illustrated as “overexposed, miserable and manipulated.”“I’m pretty honored that people chose to care about me,” Wie West said, “but it definitely was tough at times because I went through a lot of lows, really never a moment where I could just go under the radar.”Giuliani’s comments yanked Wie West out of her maternity leave and back into the spotlight. When she learned of his vulgar remarks, what she had lived and what she had learned recently about women’s place in the sports firmament coalesced into unadulterated outrage.Wie West said she started to tap out a social media response, “but I was so riled up, everything I was saying wasn’t really coming out right.”Her husband gently suggested that she carefully consider her message. “You have a chance to say something really important here,” Jonnie said he told her.In the response she drafted with input from her husband and posted to Twitter, Wie West said, in part, “What this person should have remembered from that day was the fact that I shot 64 and beat every male golfer in the field leading our team to victory.”When the writer Eric Adelson saw Giuliani’s comments, he recalled the men’s U.S. Open sectional in 2006, and following a 16-year-old Wie, who was the youngest competitor and only woman trying to earn a spot in the men’s field at Winged Foot.As he wrote three years later in the book, “The Sure Thing: The Making and Unmaking of Golf Phenom Michelle Wie,” he overheard an exchange between two college-aged men. One said, “Pretty swing,” to which the other responded with a crude comment about her physique.Speaking recently by telephone, Adelson said, “I remember cringing when I first heard that. I thought it was gross, and then when I heard what Giuliani said, I thought it was extremely gross.”He applauded Wie West’s response. “It just shows that she grew up,” Adelson said, “but a lot of other people didn’t.”A grown-up Wie West knows how to turn her anger into agency. She pitched a cotton candy blue-and-pink tie-dye hoodie with the L.P.G.A. logo to tour executive Roberta Bowman, who loved the idea. The limited-edition sweatshirts sold out after they were worn by Warriors players, and to Wie West’s surprised delight, the large and extra large sizes were snatched up first.Men clothed as billboards for the women’s game instead of ogling the women athletes. For Wie West, the victories don’t come much bigger than that. More

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      Lydia Ko Is Winning on the L.P.G.A. Tour Again

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      Sean Foley, who coached Tiger Woods for four years, has helped Ko, a former world No. 1, connect her body with her mind. She’s playing her best golf in years.LOS ANGELES — Lydia Ko of New Zealand was strolling the beach at Santa Monica on Sunday when she said she was bitten by a sea gull that swooped in and stole the sandwich in her hand. All Ko could do was laugh. Her return to the top 10 in the women’s world golf rankings after more than three years of absence has much to do with her making peace with her ability to control only so much when she is in the sand.Or on the fairway.The day before, Ko, a former world No. 1, had ended a three-year title drought at the Lotte Championship in Hawaii, cruising to a seven-stroke victory fueled by her belief that the outcome was largely out of her hands.For Ko, who at 17 became the youngest player, male or female, to reach No. 1 and had 14 L.P.G.A. wins before she turned 20, the expectations had become a burden that she could no longer comfortably shoulder. So she recently decided to release them to the winds of fate, telling herself “the winner’s already chosen.”The mantra has freed her to play the best golf she’s capable of instead of expending all her physical and psychic energies on manufacturing success. The results have made her 2021 feel like 2015. Going into this week’s L.A. Open, the seventh-ranked Ko is 38 under par in her past five competitive rounds and has 16 subpar scores in 20 competitive rounds this year. She had one bogey and 39 birdies in her last 100 holes before Wednesday, when her hot hand went cold in a round where she shot a seven-over-par 78 at Wilshire Country Club. Ko was 14 shots off the pace set by Jessica Korda, who was in her group.Ko and Gaby Lopez, during the final round of the ANA Inspiration in April. Ko finished second at the major tournament.Ringo H.W. Chiu/Associated Press“It takes a little pressure off to think that what’s meant to be is going to happen,” Ko said Tuesday. “At the end of the day, you don’t control your outcome even though you would like to.”Ko, who turns 24 on Saturday, never went away, and yet her presence on the first page of leaderboards this year has the feel of a much beloved show returning after an interminable hiatus. After her Pro-Am on Tuesday, Ko was stopped by every player or caddie she passed as made the serpentine walk through a narrow tunnel and up a hill from the ninth hole to the practice putting green.Everybody had congratulations and kind words for Ko, who has been one of the more popular players on the tour since she burst onto the golf scene like a blast of puppy’s breath.In 2012, as a 15-year-old amateur, Ko became the youngest winner of an L.P.G.A. event, topping a field at the Canadian Women’s Open that included 48 of the top 50 of the year’s leading money winners. She won the event again before turning pro at 16. The L.P.G.A. waived its 18-year-old minimum age restriction to grant her membership and Ko continued her rocket ascent. She won her first event as a professional, won Rookie of the Year honors, and won and won and won.She was so consistent, she made the cut in her first 53 L.P.G.A. events. She was in such command of her game, she had won two majors and an Olympic silver medal before her 20th birthday.But then the unimaginable happened: Ko stopped winning. Not only did the victories dry up, but Ko struggled to advance to the weekend. In the 12 months before the coronavirus pandemic shut down the tour, Ko missed four cuts, including one by seven strokes at the Evian Championship, one of the five women’s golf majors. Ko’s struggles called to mind something JoAnne Carner, a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, said in 2012 after watching Ko equal her 1969 feat of winning an L.P.G.A. event as an amateur.Ko at the 2014 United States Women’s Open Championship when she was 17 years old.Doug Mills/The New York Times“They tack a ‘professional’ after your name and all of the sudden you feel like you’re supposed to know everything,” Carner told The Times then. “There’s a lot more pressure and you try so hard and you put so much pressure on yourself.”Ko’s swing went south, but her smile never did, though at times both seemed equally mechanical. During her slump, Ko cycled through a series of swing coaches. One, David Leadbetter, who was fired at the end of 2016, was vocal in his belief that Ko’s biggest impediment to success was her overreliance on her parents. He told anyone who asked that she needed to take control of her career if she wanted to turn around her results.Last year, at the start of the pandemic, Ko made a pivotal phone call to Sean Foley, an instructor based in Orlando, Fla., where she lives, whose clients have included Tiger Woods.“I just felt like my swing was improving but I could do a little better,” said Ko, who began working with Foley during the months when the tour was shut down but the courses in Orlando remained accessible.Foley’s interest in his clients extends beyond the swing plane, and his whole-person philosophy clicked with Ko. More than any adjustment he has made to her swing, Foley has helped Ko sync her mind and her body.He reminded her that she can control only her effort, not the outcome. In the second event after the tour resumed last summer, Ko held a five-stroke lead with six holes to play. She took a one-stroke lead over a charging Danielle Kang into the final hole, a par-5, and made bogey to finish second. Just a bad day at the office, Foley told her. No big deal.Entering the final round in Hawaii with a one-stroke lead over Nelly Korda, whom she had finished second behind at the Gainbridge LPGA in February, she retrieved one final text from Foley before she teed off. It read: Trust and conviction.Ko won in Hawaii with a tournament record 28 under par.Christian Petersen/Getty ImagesShe wrote the words on her yardage book, then went out and played that way, closing with a 65 to clinch her first victory in 1,084 days.“I think that settled some of the doubts I had in myself,” Ko said Tuesday, adding, “I felt pretty calm playing. That’s where I feel like it should be. Like just because I shoot a 68 or 78, that shouldn’t dictate my mood and the way I am around the golf course.”Ko considered the win as much a validation of her parents, and their approach, as of her and her game. “For them to get criticism I thought was unfair because they’re just doing everything they can to wish me to be happier,” she said.Foley’s work with Ko is focused on finding that happiness, win or lose. For all her precocity — perhaps because of it — Ko had skipped over that lesson. She had to learn it the hard way. More

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      Jennifer Kupcho’s Fast Start in Golf

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      She won the first Augusta National Women’s Amateur in 2019 when she was 22. She has since turned pro.Jennifer Kupcho won the inaugural Augusta National Women’s Amateur in 2019. After a stellar collegiate career at Wake Forest University, she entered the event as the No.-1 ranked amateur in the world. In the final round, the weekend before Tiger Woods would win his fifth Masters championship on the same course, Kupcho faced Maria Fassi.In the last six holes, Kupcho rallied to go five under par and beat Fassi by four strokes. Soon after, Kupcho turned pro, and has won over $1 million in her first two seasons.Ahead of the second Augusta National Women’s Amateur, Kupcho, 23, shared her experience, including initially turning down her invitation to Augusta. The interview has been edited and condensed.What was it like to get that invitation to the first Augusta National Women’s Amateur?When I actually got the invite, I turned it down. I had gotten my L.P.G.A. card and decided to defer it so I could go back to school. The reason I was going back was to be with my team. We had a lot of tournaments lined up that spring. Initially it would have been too many tournaments. A month later, one of my tournaments got canceled. I talked it over with my college coaches and my parents. I asked Augusta if they’d let me back in. At that point I was No. 1 in the world.What did Augusta say when you turned down the invite?(Laughs.) I don’t remember exactly. My dad did a lot of my travel stuff when I was an amateur. He did make me email the tournament director myself to ask if they still had a spot.Kevin C. Cox/Getty ImagesWhat was the tournament week like?I had an event the week before, with my team. My parents came, and we all drove down in my Honda Civic from college. I got to play Augusta two years before with the Wake Forest team. It was nice to have already played it. I had already been awe-struck. When we first showed up, we got treated like royalty. It was so well organized. It was probably the best tournament I’ve ever played, even to this day as a professional golfer. After the first night, I said I’m glad I’m playing in this.What was the feeling among the other competitors at Augusta?We were all just so excited to go play Augusta. Maria and I had a decent lead over the other girls. I felt like I was going into battle with Maria, but we were also just such good friends from college golf.What were you thinking in the final round?I still think to this day that it’s crazy. It’s like my body just took over. That’s true for all events. I practice so much that my body just takes over to where I’m just thinking about yardages and how am I going to hit this shot.What did it feel like after you won it?I was so in shock. I had so much adrenaline. It’s hard to describe the feelings. I didn’t embrace it for months later. Even in interviews, I was like, I won a tournament. It didn’t feel big to me. But now it ranks very high for sure. It’s a very big moment in my career.What will you be thinking this year watching the second Women’s Amateur?The first thing that comes to mind is how are these girls going to follow up what Maria and I did. After that, I think, who’s going to win and do they realize how much this is going to change their life? I definitely did not.What has turning pro been like for you compared with your amateur and collegiate career?The biggest adjustment has probably been in my schedule. As a professional, I’m playing almost every week, traveling all over the world. During my amateur and collegiate career, I had much more time in between tournaments to practice and recover, so it was a bit more manageable.Another adjustment has been the strength of my competition. There is so much talent on the L.P.G.A., and I’m playing against the best players in the world every week. More

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      A Rookie Wins the ANA Inspiration Ahead of a Fast-Closing Challenger

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      Patty Tavatanakit of Thailand won the first women’s golf major of the year, holding off Lydia Ko, whose final round of 10-under 62 put her two strokes short.RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — Generation Next was in full flower over the weekend. Not at the former nursery in Georgia where youngsters and the top female amateurs convened for separate events at the invitation of the Augusta National Golf Club members who run the Masters Tournament, but across the country where a 21-year-old rookie, Patty Tavatanakit, won the ANA Inspiration on Sunday.The 50th edition of the ANA Inspiration, the first of the five women’s golf majors of the year, will be remembered for Tavatanakit’s mastery of the course at Mission Hills Country Club and of the moment.She led from start to finish to become the first rookie winner since Juli Inkster in 1984 and the first champion from Thailand in tournament history. She closed with a three-under 68 — her fourth consecutive sub-70 round — for a cumulative score of 18-under 270 to hold off a fast-closing Lydia Ko by two strokes. Ko’s 10-under 62 on Sunday was one of the most memorable final rounds in men’s or women’s major history.With no fans on the course because of coronavirus restrictions, there were no roars to make Tavatanakit aware of what was happening in front of her. And she said she never once glanced at a leaderboard. “I didn’t feel the need to,” she said, adding, “I just wanted to play like it was another round of golf.”Tavatanakit, who averaged more than 300 yards off the tee for the week, began the day with a five-stroke lead over the field and an eight-stroke advantage over Ko. For all the talk about Tavatanakit’s length, her touch on and around the greens proved clutch.She chipped in for an eagle at the par-5 second, nearly chipped in two other times on the back nine and made an eight-foot putt to save par at No. 15 to keep Ko, the 2016 ANA Inspiration champion, at a club’s length.Playing two groups ahead of Tavatanakit, Ko, 23, of New Zealand, applied more heat than a desert sun with a front-nine seven-under 29, a tournament record. She was nine under through 11, and climbed within two shots of the lead, but Tavatanakit did not wilt. Under the most intense pressure, Tavatanakit produced her second bogey-free round of the week.“I felt like I gave myself a good run at it,” said Ko, whose last L.P.G.A. victory was in 2018, “but maybe Patty was just a bit too far away.”Roughly 90 minutes before Tavatanakit teed off, Cristie Kerr put the finishing touches on a seven-under 65, her lowest round in 23 starts in the tournament. As Kerr signed her card in the scoring tent, she glanced up at a television tuned to Golf Channel, which was showing a replay of the Drive, Chip and Putt contest that had taken place earlier in the day at Augusta National.Plastered on the glassed back wall, in direct view of the players as they reviewed their scorecards, were posters with sayings from former champions, including the three-time winner Amy Alcott, who said, “This tournament really got women’s sports on the move.”The 43-year-old Kerr, who counts two major championships among her 20 tour titles, made her debut in this event as an amateur in 1996. Seventeen strokes off the pace at the day’s start, Kerr started in the fourth group in the morning and plotted her way around the course unburdened by expectations.“All day I just kind of played with no fear,” Kerr said. “I’m thinking to myself, ‘Why doesn’t that happen every day?’”The boldness of which Kerr spoke is Tavatanakit’s default mentality. Before sleeping on her first 54-hole lead in an L.P.G.A. Tour event, she said her mind-set Sunday would be, “Keep on the pedal.”Tavatanakit took the winner’s traditional dip into Poppie’s Pond, the water hazard that surrounds the 18th hole. Kelvin Kuo/USA Today Sports, via ReutersIn 2019, in her second ANA Inspiration appearance, Tavatanakit earned low amateur honors, closing with a 68 to finish tied for 26th. She was a standout sophomore at U.C.L.A. at the time, but her presence at the event, a launching pad for amateurs long before Michelle Wie tied for ninth in 2003 as a 13-year-old, was not a given.The inaugural Augusta National Women’s Amateur was being played at the same time. The opportunity it offered to play the final round on one of the world’s most storied courses had to be weighed against the chance to measure one’s game against the world’s most celebrated players.Tavatanakit was one of a handful of eligible players who chose to bypass the amateur event to compete at Mission Hills. The decision, she said, questioned by many at the time, set Tavatanakit on a path that ended Sunday with her taking the winner’s traditional dip in Poppie’s Pond, the water hazard surrounding the 18th island green.Her top 30 showing in 2019, she said, convinced her that she was ready to take a leap of faith. “I kind of had a thought of turning pro, I played well and that just made it more clear,” said Tavatanakit, who gave up her collegiate eligibility in May 2019.By year’s end, Tavatanakit had won three times on the L.P.G.A.’s developmental tour. Her 2020 rookie season, which has been extended through 2021, featured a top five in February at the Gainbridge L.P.G.A., where she gained valuable experience playing in the last group with the eventual winner, Nelly Korda, but also seven missed cuts.Tavatanakit suggested that her commitment to the ANA Inspiration in 2019 helped her immensely this year. The four rounds at Mission Hills in 2019 gave her enough course knowledge to commit to the aggressive lines she took.“Looking back, I think coming here and playing here enough to know how the course is, it was really good,” she said.Tavatanakit’s eyes were wet before she jumped into Poppie’s Pond. She became emotional before hitting her last putt, she said, because she was thinking, “Oh, man, I’m actually going to do this.”She had made history and she had done it by grafting off women’s golf’s roots. More

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      For Korea’s Golfers Eyeing the Olympics, More Than Four Is a Crowd

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      Each country can send only four women to Tokyo, and with six Korean golfers in the world’s top 15, just making the team can feel harder than winning gold.RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — So Yeon Ryu is a two-time major winner and a former world No. 1 who entered this week’s ANA Inspiration, the first L.P.G.A. major of the year, as a top 20 player. Ryu’s credentials for the Tokyo Olympics this summer are solid gold.Her passport is her problem.Ryu is from South Korea, where champion women golfers are an abundant natural resource. With three months until the team rosters for the delayed Summer Games in Tokyo are finalized, Ryu is No. 16 in the world but No. 7 in her homeland.The Olympic qualification standards dictate that every player in the top 15 is eligible to compete but that no country can have more than four representatives in the 60-player field. Led by Jin Young Ko, Koreans hold the top three spots.“I don’t know that there’s a harder team in sport to make right now,” said Mike Whan, the departing L.P.G.A. commissioner.In 2016, when golf returned to the Olympics as a medal sport for the first time since 1904, Ryu missed a berth on the South Korean team despite a top-12 world ranking.“It’s tougher to make the team from my country than to win the gold medal,” said Ryu, who opened with an even-par 72 Thursday at Mission Hills. Patty Tavatanakit of Thailand shot a six-under-par 66 to lead the field.South Korean champions have been plentiful over the past decade, capturing 23 of the 47 L.P.G.A. majors contested. They occupy 14 of the top 35 spots in the world rankings. For players desiring to distinguish themselves, making the Olympic team is a priority.“So many players are playing so well from Korea that I want to say people back home are less appreciative to see what we’re doing on the tour,” said Ryu, 30, whose major titles came at the 2011 United States Women’s Open and the 2017 ANA Inspiration, both in playoffs. “They’re more keen to see the Olympics because they know it’s really, really tough to make the team.”Inbee Park, Ryu’s best friend and compatriot, won the women’s competition at the Rio Olympics, by five strokes over New Zealand’s Lydia Ko, then the top-ranked player. With the country’s team members all so highly ranked, Korean officials were confident of at least one medal in the women’s competition. Park overcame a wrist injury that had slowed her progress all year and delivered on the expectations.No stranger to the spotlight, she took the golf world on a thrilling ride in 2013 when she won the first three majors in a bid to become the first professional, male or female, to win four in the same year. But never, Park said, had she felt more pressure. After arriving in Brazil, Park absorbed the sense of urgency radiated by the archers, the swimmers, the taekwondo athletes and the handball players representing Korea who have one chance every four years to craft their legacies.“You get so much attention from the people and the country and from everyone pretty much,” Park, now 32 and a seven-time major champion, said this week. “I think it’s double, triple, probably 10 times more pressure than I ever felt in a major championship.”Whan said the telecast of Park’s final round drew a 27.1 rating in South Korea. To put that in context, he said, Park’s unsuccessful bid for history at the 2013 Women’s British Open — she finished 14 strokes behind the winner, Stacy Lewis — got an 8, which was roughly the same as the rating for Tiger Woods’s victorious final round at the 2019 Masters.“So imagine Tiger at Augusta times three,” Whan said. “She went from being a really noteworthy golfer to being one of the most famous people in Korea in one weekend.”Ryu didn’t plan to watch any of the 2016 Olympics coverage. “I was so close to making the team that it definitely hurt for me,” Ryu said. “I wanted to avoid it as much as I can.”She added, “But when you know your best friend is rocking it in Rio, you have to watch.”Ryu was glad she saw Park clinch the gold. She credits Park’s performance in the Olympics with her own victory at Mission Hills and ascent to No. 1 the following year.“Before Rio I was maybe so afraid, ‘What is going to happen if I miss the Olympics?’” Ryu said. “So I almost just wanted to believe winning a major is better than the Olympics.”She added: “After Inbee won the gold medal, I was definitely jealous — not of her but because I felt she did something that was big for the whole golf industry. Maybe that motivation really helped me to play well in 2017.”Inbee Park, right, with Chun Lee-Kyung, a four-time Olympic champion in short-track speed skating, during the opening ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympics. Park saw her stardom explode after she won gold at the Rio Games. Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesIn 2018, South Korea hosted the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. In a nod to her new stature, Park was chosen as one of the final torch bearers. As she ran with the flame into the Olympic Stadium, slowly to avoid tripping in conditions so cold she could hardly feel her feet, her friend Ryu sat awe-struck in the crowd of 35,000.After being so near the top 10 and still so far from qualifying for the 2016 Olympics, Ryu recognized it might be her only chance to experience an Olympics up close. More

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      No Longer a ‘Tigress,’ Amari Avery Will Try to Make Augusta Roar

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      Avery, 17, and her dad once drew attention for their Tiger-and-Earl Woods aspirations. They hope to make a different sort of splash at the Augusta National Women’s Amateur.It’s been eight years since Amari Avery made her first “splash” — her word — in golf. A 2013 Netflix documentary on elite grade school golfers introduced an 8-year-old Avery cruising her Riverside, Calif., street on her bike, pink handlebar streamers blowing in the wind, as Notorious B.I.G.’s “Going Back to Cali” blared in the background.What “The Short Game” showed came to define the perception of Avery on the junior golf circuit. Much of the documentary centered on how her dad, Andre, had appointed her “Tigress” after she won a junior world championship at 6 years old and was trying to navigate the expensive territory of junior golf by following Earl Woods’s handling of Tiger. Amari’s story arc in the film ends with both her and her father in tears after a disappointing finish at the United States Kids Golf World Championship.Now 17, Amari Avery will roll down Magnolia Lane with the chance to make a different splash at golf’s most recognizable venue.“It’s definitely going to be slightly overwhelming,” she said of walking out onto the course at Augusta National, where she is one of 85 invitees to the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. “But I think that me just being there could be inspiring for girls like me. I’m going to be out there to play for myself and just show people that people like me can be out there, we can be at that high level and play.”That venue’s history with both African-Americans and women — an African-American man did not play in the Masters Tournament until 1975 and the club did not add its first two female members, the former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and the financier Darla Moore, until 2012 — is not lost on Avery. The daughter of an African-American father and a Filipino mother, she is one of a scant few Black female golfers on either the amateur or professional levels of the sport.“I didn’t think that I would see any woman playing competitive golf at Augusta National,” said Renee Powell, who in 1967 became just the second Black woman to join the L.P.G.A. Tour. “Let alone a Black woman.”Powell never had the opportunity to play Augusta National and emailed its chairman, Fred Ridley, to commend him for hosting the women’s amateur event, first played in 2019. As the captain of the United States team for this year’s Junior Solheim Cup — which pits the 12 top young amateurs in the United States against their European counterpoints — Powell monitors the top junior women’s players and occasionally checks in with Andre to keep tabs on Amari’s development.“She seems to be the real deal,” Powell said.Amari Avery and fellow golfer Bailey Davis posed together during a practice round at the Houston’s Mack Champ Invitational in mid-March. “I’m going to be out there to play for myself and just show people that people like me can be out there, we can be at that high level and play.”Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York TimesThis is just the second edition of the Augusta National Women’s Amateur, following the event’s cancellation last April in the earliest months of the coronavirus pandemic. But even Avery’s invite does not guarantee that she will spend much time on the hallowed course. She’ll play a practice round there early in the week but because the tournament’s first two rounds are held at the nearby Champions Retreat, Avery will need to make the cut to play on the course where her idol, Tiger Woods, has made so much history.“I couldn’t even imagine what it would be like getting to play Augusta National,” Avery said in her typically deliberate and measured way. The final round of the amateur tournament will be played in front of a limited number of patrons, just like this year’s Masters, and broadcast by NBC Sports. “Obviously being the only Black person there, hopefully I can do something out there and make some upsets, some roars.”She’s ready to make a mark on golf on her own terms, a far cry from the reputation the Averys earned in the Netflix documentary, that of a helicopter dad and his prodigy, driven by pressure to win rather than fun.“We want to speak it into existence,” Andre cut in. “We’re going to play Augusta in the tourney. That’s going to happen.”As father and daughter grew together, Andre gave up on the “Tigress” nickname, stopped trying to impose elements of Tiger’s swing onto Amari and yielded to a coach’s instruction. Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York TimesTo get to this point, Amari chased Woods’s ghost around California’s junior golf circuit and her own household. Andre tried to follow Earl Woods’s book “Training a Tiger” to the letter, compelled in part because Amari and Tiger share the same birthdays, were born in the same county, have similar mixed-race backgrounds, made holes-in-one on the same course, and both won junior world championships around the same age. Andre even once entered her into a junior tournament as “Tigress Avery.” He says it was a joke after being egged on by a friend and he quickly chided himself when there was confusion in scoring over her name.But Amari has not faded against the comparisons even as a Tiger-inspired wave of young golfers failed to crest. She won the prestigious 2019 California Women’s Amateur Championship. In her debut at the U.S. Women’s Amateur, she made it out of the cutthroat stroke play portion of the week and then advanced to the round of 32 in match play. She has won on the Cactus Tour, a women’s mini circuit with fields full of professionals. Last August, she verbally committed to join the powerhouse women’s golf program at the University of Southern California in 2022.The Averys credit her mother, Maria, as the one who makes the family golf pursuit possible, keeping an eye on the pressures and costs and serving as the final judge of when to pull the plug if either mounts. Andre can remotely work as an information technology consultant while on the road with Amari and Alona, 14, also a highly rated junior golfer. Of her four siblings, Amari is closest to Alona, who was on the bag for Amari’s debut U.S. Women’s Amateur last summer when big sis posted a calamitous 40 on the front-nine of her opening round, but steadied herself to rally for the second-best score of the second round to easily make the match play bracket.Of her four siblings, Amari, right, said she is closest to Alona, 14, who was on the bag for Amari’s debut U.S. Women’s Amateur last summer.Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York TimesTo balance her own drive against the disappointments that can come during a tough round, Amari worked with Jay Brunza, a psychologist whom she credited with steadying her mental approach ahead of last year’s women’s amateur. “He was saying, ‘Stay stable out there. Just try to hit fairways and greens,” Amari recalled. “He tells me a whole bunch of different things that help out. You can go out there and shoot a 40 and the next nine a 33 and you’re not out of it.”It helps that Brunza worked with teenage Tiger Woods, caddying for him during all three of Woods’s men’s amateur titles.Andre will be on the bag for Amari at the Augusta National Women’s Amateur, hoping to make a different impression than when he cursed during arguments with Amari when she was 8, and was depicted as the “mean parent,” a portrayal he admits was fair.“It’s not me wanting to caddie because I want the spotlight,” Andre said. “It’s all the stuff we’ve gone through. Now it comes full circle. I think that’s the best way for us, with her going off to school next in a few months for us to play in this thing together.”“Training a Tiger” was published in 1997, well before the full impact and collateral costs of Earl Woods’s approach on his son could have been known. But for a nonwhite parent-prodigy team navigating junior golf, the Woodses’ account was the primary road map available to the Averys.Still, Andre said he’s learned to grow along with Amari. He’s given up on the “Tigress” nickname, stopped trying to impose elements of Tiger’s swing onto Amari and yielded to a coach’s instruction. Before Amari’s 2019 California Women’s Amateur title, the team went through a revolving door of swing coaches, so many that father and daughter lost count.Amari and Andre shared a laugh on the course.Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York Times“We were just kind of bouncing around trying to find that one key thing that will turn things around instead of just trusting a process and letting it handle itself,” she said. “I had just come to the understanding that things aren’t going to come fast all the time.”Amari has learned to push back on her father, too. “When we’re out there on the course and I’m struggling or I’m working on something and he’s trying to constantly tell me to do something, I’m like, ‘Dad, get off. I just want to do it myself.’”Both Averys have confidence that she could be a potential superstar on the L.P.G.A. Tour, and has the Tiger trifecta: entertaining golf, winning golf, and a marketable persona. Andre will still admit to his belief in a bond with the Woodses. “We’re so tied to that Tiger Woods-Earl Woods thing,” he said. “There is a connection, I truly believe. It is divine.”As Amari has grown, she’s improved her approach to golf and managing the relationship with her most ardent fan. Whatever stigma Andre may carry, he is a parent who has committed substantial time and money for instruction and travel to keep Amari progressing in the game.Those required resources are still a massive challenge to diversifying the game. The Averys are often the only Black family at high profile amateur events, just as they were on the junior circuit, just as Earl and Tiger Woods were.“I just don’t feel like there’s much of a push for them to be out here,” Amari said, adding, “that’s kind of what I want to bring into the game a little bit, influence some of these kids that look like me, like ‘Hey you can be out here. You can make a splash out here.’”She has been watching video from the 2019 Augusta National Women’s Amateur and traveled to Augusta for the first time in her life in early March to play the Champions Retreat course. Just days before she left, Andre discovered in conversation with the father of Zoe Campos, who finished in a tie for fifth in 2019, that Champions Retreat was actually a 27-hole facility. He needed to figure out the 18-hole routing on which they would play the event. There was scouting work to do in the final month.Amari Avery won the Mack Champ Invitational in the lead-up to playing the Augusta tournament. She’s committed to join the U.S.C. golf team in 2022.Michael Starghill Jr. for The New York TimesLike all teenage athletes during the coronavirus pandemic, Amari’s schedule and prep work has been abnormal. She said it’s been slow since a quick run of high-profile amateur events last summer. This year she made a few starts on the Cactus Tour, showing well and finishing runner-up in a February field with both pros and amateurs. In late March, she went to Houston and cruised to a win in the inaugural Mack Champ Invitational, an event for junior golfers from diverse backgrounds started by Cameron Champ, one of the few Black players on the PGA Tour.The Averys met Lee Elder, the first Black man to play in the Masters and an honorary starter for this year’s tournament, but they have never met Woods. Amari dreamed of one day meeting — and maybe beating — him, figuring a chance meeting at Augusta would probably be the closest she was going to get.Then when she first learned of his February car accident, she had what she termed a “Kobe moment” and feared the worst. “I don’t even know if I could keep playing golf,” she said, considering the worst case scenario on the day of his accident. “He’s been the main guy that’s driven my entire career,” she added. “I’ve been compared to Tiger and I kind of want him to see my career grow and see it progress.”A visit to Augusta National is a significant milepost in that progression, but the Averys have distinct memories and associations with the course and the Masters, especially when it comes to Woods’s history there. Andre has imparted lots of it via YouTube clips, but Amari’s first real opportunity to closely watch Woods dominate in real time was during his historic 2019 win.The Augusta National Women’s Amateur gives her a chance to make history of her own at the club. More

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      In Naming a New Chief Executive, the U.S.G.A. Looks to the Women’s Game

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      AdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyIn Naming a New Chief Executive, the U.S.G.A. Looks to the Women’s GameWith the L.P.G.A., Mike Whan grew women’s golf. Now he’ll try to solve some of the sport’s most contentious debates: outrageous distances off the tee and a return to more traditional sites.Mike Whan with the L.P.G.A. in 2015. He will take over the U.S.G.A. sometime this summer.Credit…Chris O’Meara/Associated PressFeb. 17, 2021, 11:02 a.m. ETIn an imaginative decision for one of the most resolutely traditional organizations in American sports, the United States Golf Association announced Wednesday that its new chief executive would be Mike Whan, who has spent the last 11 years as the resourceful commissioner of the L.P.G.A. Tour.Whan, 56, will replace Mike Davis, the top executive at the U.S.G.A., which conducts the United States Open and 13 other national championships. Five months ago, Davis, a 30-year U.S.G.A. employee, revealed that 2021 would be his last year with the organization. In January, in a surprise, Whan announced his intention to leave the L.P.G.A.In an interview Tuesday, Whan said he called Davis before accepting the U.S.G.A.’s offer.“I said, you know me and you know the job, is this a bad idea?” Whan recalled. “Mike said, ‘Stop talking, you need to get into this job.’”Whan added: “I can stay in the game I love. I can have a seat that can make a real difference.”Stu Francis, the U.S.G.A. president, said Tuesday that he had been thinking about Whan as a possible Davis successor since Whan made a presentation to the association’s executive committee four years ago. Noting that the U.S.G.A., a nonprofit with annual revenues of roughly $225 million, invests in myriad golf initiatives and helps writes golf’s rule book, Francis called running the U.S.G.A. “a multifaceted job.” Of Whan, Francis added: “He has all the skill sets and has demonstrated those skill sets.”Whan, who will assume his U.S.G.A. duties at an unspecified date this summer, took over a struggling L.P.G.A. in 2010 and guided it through financial challenges, eventually expanded the tour from 24 events to 34 and nearly doubled the prize money. During the pandemic, when many tournaments were not held, Whan was able to preserve event sponsors, and the purses for the 18 tournaments the L.P.G.A. did host were not reduced.As L.P.G.A. commissioner, Whan has spent years in regular contact with leaders of golf’s governing bodies, including the U.S.G.A., the PGA Tour and the R&A, the organization that conducts the British Open.But at least in America, Whan will soon be the point man for a variety of issues facing golf, the thorniest of which is whether the sport’s leaders should enact new rules to inhibit the prodigious distances off the tee that can be achieved by technologically advanced golf balls and clubs. A recent report sponsored by the U.S.G.A. and the R&A, a co-partner overseeing the rule book, hinted at potential changes in equipment restrictions.Asked about the report on Tuesday, Whan said: “There’s little argument that we’ve known distance is a problem for a long time.” He added, “I think change is coming and needs to — how grand that change is has yet to be determined.”But Whan, who worked for Wilson Sporting Goods and TaylorMade Golf before joining the L.P.G.A., said there would still be room for innovation in the vast golf equipment market.“I think all the people that hear about change think, ‘Oh, no, it’s over, they’re going to put a governor on and everybody’s going to have all the same distance,’” he said. “Nobody has any interest in doing that to either the game or the people that make the game exciting.”Whan will also be central to ascertaining which courses will be selected as U.S.G.A. championship sites, particularly when it comes to the U.S. Open and the U.S. Women’s Open. Some of the most controversial decisions in Davis’s tenure stemmed from a desire to branch out from an established, if unofficial, rotation of traditional sites for the association’s premier events. That led to the U.S. Open’s being played in largely untested venues like Chambers Bay in Washington State and Erin Hills in Wisconsin with, at best, mixed results.Lately, the U.S.G.A. has signaled its inclination to return to golf courses with a history of hosting the national golf championship, something endorsed by Francis and Whan.“You’re going to see much more of a locking in on traditional sites,” Francis said.Whan, who will be just the U.S.G.A.’s eighth chief executive, said players wanted the same thing. Cognizant that this year’s U.S. Women’s Open will be contested at the Olympic Club in San Francisco for the first time (it has hosted the U.S. Open five times), Whan said, “I can promise you right now there are players on the L.P.G.A. dreaming of Olympic.”Davis, who is leaving the U.S.G.A. to pursue his interest in golf course design, endorsed Whan’s selection.“I’ve had the pleasure of working with Mike Whan for many years, and I view him as a trusted, strategic leader who has a proven track record of building collaborative partnerships,” Davis said in a statement. “I know the U.S.G.A. will be in great hands, and I look forward to partnering with Mike to ensure a smooth and successful transition.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More