Mark Garrod
Things may be tight at the top of the men’s game in the run-up to The Masters, but with the first major of the women’s season even closer, the situation could not be more different.
The gap between Taiwan’s Yani Tseng and second-placed Korean Na Yeon Choi is almost the same as the one between Choi and 147th-ranked Laura Davies.
That brings back memories of when Tiger Woods was in his pomp. When Woods completed his clean sweep of the majors at the 2001 Masters, his lead over second-placed Phil Mickelson was more than the gap between Mickelson and the very last of more than 1,000 players on the rankings.
The Kraft Nabisco Championship starts in California next Thursday and Tseng, who had her 23rd birthday in January, has one more warm-up event this week to complete her preparations.
Already with five majors to her name, including the last two Ricoh British Opens at Birkdale and Carnoustie, she recorded her 14th LPGA Tour victory in Phoenix on Sunday.
From three strokes behind, Tseng birdied five of the first six holes on the back nine and, as darkness fell after a day of lightning delays and hailstorms, parred in for a one-shot win over Choi and world number seven Ai Miyazato.
“She’s amazing,” Choi said. “I mean, she never looks nervous or if there’s pressure on her.
“I don’t know who can stop her right now. She hits it really far; me and Ai we tried our best, but she’s pretty far away from us.”
The victory took Tseng’s Tour earnings through the $8m mark in record time – just 99 events. It was also her fifth title on the circuit in her last 11 starts and 14th worldwide since the start of last year.
Among those competing against Tseng next week will be Woburn’s Charley Hull, seventh and the highest-placed British player on the women’s amateur world rankings.
At just 15 Hull won the English and Welsh strokeplay titles last season, but deciding to go out early to the States prior to the Kraft Nabisco has come at a cost. By not attending this week’s Curtis Cup trial at Nairn she has been told she will no longer be considered for June’s match against the Americans there.
John Petrie, chief executive of England Golf, expressed the hope the Ladies’ Golf Union would have “sufficient flexibility to revisit this decision”, but it has not happened yet.
In an interview in her county golf magazine, Hull, one of five amateurs invited, said: “It’s my first ever major. I didn’t want to turn that down because of the experience I would gain.
“It was a really difficult decision, but everyone has now moved on from that. I’m looking forward to playing in the Kraft Nabisco and the LGU are concentrating on winning back the Curtis Cup. I hope we are both successful.”
On travelling a week before she added: “Amateurs are not allowed to play on the course on the two days before the tournament starts, so I want to get as much course time before then as they will let me.”
Such a rule might seem unfair, but it is not the only one like it in existence. At the US Open the reserves for the tournament have to go and find another course to practise on.
Source: http://feeds.examiner.ie/~r/iesportsblog/~3/5dYozUr7R1Y/post.aspx
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