In a humorous television spot that began airing earlier this year, veterans of the LPGA tour offer assistance to younger players who are facing the challenges of playing professional golf.
From guidance on where to find player registration — it is not in the custodian’s closet — to unloading gear, taking care of tan lines, picking head covers and opening a locker, the seasoned set lend a helping hand.
But notice that there is no supervision offered to the youngsters when it comes to playing inside the ropes. No, the new kids on the block have that covered.
Entering Thursday’s start of the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship — a collaboration between the PGA of America, KPMG and the LPGA tour that is the second major of the season — the first 14 LPGA tournaments were won by nine players who were 23 or younger.
Anna Nordqvist, 28, snapped the streak last week by winning the ShopRite LPGA Classic by one shot over Haru Nomura, 23, who has won twice this season.
Two favorites at Sahalee Country Club this week are Lydia Ko, 19, the world No. 1 who has won the last two majors, and Ariya Jutanugarn, 20, who won all three LPGA events in May and is No. 10 in the world.
Another favorite is No. 3 Lexi Thompson, 21, who is in her sixth year on the tour. She won her seventh title this year in the Honda LPGA Thailand. In 2011, she became the youngest winner of an LPGA event when she won the Navistar LPGA Classic at 16. A year later, however, Ko broke the record when she won the first of her 12 career titles at 15.
“Records are made to be broken. The game is getting younger and younger, and that’s really what we want to see out here,” Thompson said. “We want to see the game grow even more and have the girls start at a younger age,”
Or as Ko said, “Age is just a number.”
Yes, but it’s a new age on the LPGA tour, populated with youngsters who started specializing in golf far sooner than their predecessors. Technological progression in equipment, training, video and advancements in nutrition and coaching have sped the process of achievement.
A player working with a sports psychologist while still in their teens was unheard of decades ago. And top-notch golf academies and competition in junior golf the world over keep getting better and provide the perfect breeding ground.
‘Much more mature’
While the tour has been trending younger since the turn of the century, it is now a traveling Romper Room full of big kids who have talent, disciplined games, patience, mature course management skills, strong mental games and textbook swings.
“When I want to joke around with them, there are so many jokes I can’t tell them,” said LPGA tour commissioner Michael Whan, 51. “You can’t tell them a joke about M*A*S*H* because they don’t know what M*A*S*H* is.”
Alan Alda and Loretta Swit shouldn’t be offended, for the last episode of M*A*S*H* ran in 1983 — 14 years before Ko was born. That year, by the way, Juli Inkster, who is still a threat to win at 55, won her first LPGA tour title.
This year the average age of the winners in the first 14 events was 21.1. In contrast, there were 24 players 22 or older who played in this year’s women’s NCAA golf championships.
Last year the average age of the winner on the LPGA tour was 24.3, five years ago it was 26.1, and 10 years ago it was 28.2.
Last year there were 15 events won by players 23 and younger. Five years ago that number was 10. Ten years ago it was six.
“I always give a talk at rookie orientation, and I’ve used the same note cards for seven years,” Whan said. “And one of my key points is to say, ‘Don’t make winning an objective in Year One.’ I would tell them that some of the biggest names they can think of didn’t win as a rookie. There’s a lot to get used to — travel, hotels, finding restaurants, courses they’ve never seen before, just so much stuff. It takes a while to figure that stuff out.
“Now the kids come out, and they are ready for all the other aspects of golf. They are just so much more mature. Nothing bothers them. They are just so much more prepared to be successful. ...
“To say you can’t win as a teenager, that’s out. To say you have to gain experience before winning, that’s out. The expectation to win at a young age is high now, because they’ve seen others do it. … So I just have to throw away all my rookie orientation cards.”
Golf Channel’s Jerry Foltz is thrown for a loop when he meets parents of young stars “and I’m well older than they are.” For six years he’s had a front-row seat to this youth movement as an on-course analyst.
“The level of golf the kids are playing at such a young age is not a fad anymore,” said Foltz, 53. “I honestly believe if the LPGA didn’t have an 18-year-old age requirement to play, we’d have 14- and 15-year-old girls qualifying for the tour.”
He’s especially impressed by Brooke Henderson, who won her lone LPGA tour title last year at 17. This year she has nine top-10s in 14 starts.
“Brooke Henderson has a 40-year-old golf mind. She has the poise and class and manners of somebody twice her age,” Foltz said. “She treats people incredibly well; she’s probably the best interview on tour, and she has that killer instinct you would never guess she has. She is 100% the real deal. She’s just one of so many young stars coming from all over the world. They are tremendous young ladies. They are great ambassadors for the game.”
Singular focus
While Morgan Pressel wasn’t taken aback when asked to narrate the LPGA commercial on the kids, she did have a chuckle when it was pointed out she is, well, just 28. Then again, she’s a 10-year veteran, and she can certainly relate to the adolescents raising trophies. She was 12 when she qualified for the 2001 U.S. Women’s Open and 18 when she became the youngest to win a major championship in the modern era. The youngest, that is, until Ko took over that designation when she won last year’s Evian Championship.
“Sometimes I look at the youngsters and think, ‘Wow that was me,’” Pressel said. “It’s kind of funny to think about sometimes because I don’t feel that old myself. … But what the younger players are doing is pretty impressive. It’s just a changing culture … to focus on one sport, whether it’s golf or tennis or baseball or basketball or whatever. More kids are becoming more singularly focused on one sport.”
Stacy Lewis, 31, a former world No.1 and two-time major champion, says it’s far tougher to win these days than it was five years ago because of the kids she sees on the first tee.
In a practice round this year with Yani Tseng, a former world No.1 who won her first of five majors as a teen in 2008, Lewis was reminded of how tough it is.
“(Yani) said, ‘Why is Lydia (Ko) so good?’ And we talked about it a little while, and I said you get in these modes playing where you can do no wrong, and if you miss a shot you’re like, ‘OK, I can go get that up-and-down,’” said Lewis, who is No.7 in the world. “You just have a lot of players that are so young that are in that mind-set that they’re not scared.
“They’re not afraid of hitting a bad shot. They’re fine trying to drive it 280 down the fairway and they’re OK if it’s in the rough. You’ve got these fearless young kids that have changed the game and they’ve changed the way women play golf.”
Karen Stupples agreed. The Golf Channel analyst won the 2004 Women’s British Open. She played with Ko in the 2010 Australian Open when Ko was 13. That day changed how Stupples, 42, looked at the women’s game.
“I had been playing pretty well at the time,” Stupples said. “I’m about 20, 30 yards longer. She’s out there hitting hybrids into greens. And at the end of the day, I signed off for a 70 and she signed off for a 67, and I’m going, ‘How in the world did that happen? I’ve just been beaten by a 13-year-old.’ It was impressive. And the kids keep coming. ...
“They work on their golf game like women work on their golf game when they got to college. You are advancing the process. Mentally they are more mature. They play fearless golf. When you have younger players winning, you are having fearless golf seen by so many. The kids are a breath of fresh air for the LPGA tour.”
But they are not sucking the oxygen out of the veterans. Angela Stanford was 25 in 2003 when she won the first of her five LPGA titles. Now 38, she’s both inspired and motivated by the youngsters, even if they make her think about her birth certificate.
“When Megan Khang and I switched places in a pro-am I remember thinking, ‘I’m 20 years older than this girl,’” Stanford said. “These kids come out here, and they’re stronger, fitter and mentally a little bit different from previous years. When they get here, they are more of a complete package than it’s ever been. It used to be when you got out here, you had to gain some experience, but not any more, apparently.”
She talks about the differences she sees in the young women playing today.
“I certainly didn’t look at what I was eating when I was in my teens,” she said. “I grew up playing a lot of sports. So whatever fitness I had was from playing the other sports. Once I got to college, that’s when we did some specialized training. I didn’t know until five years into my LPGA career that I needed a trainer. I didn’t know you had to specialize. Now everybody specializes. ...
“These kids light it up. But the one thing I love is the game continues to be a challenge for me. Every year there’s a new young star, so for me I want to see how long I can stay and compete with them.”
