Major, minor motivations
Compiled from Times staff, wiresPublished June 28, 2007
The U.S. Women's Open begins today at Pine Needles Lodge and Golf Club in Southern Pines, N.C. While Lorena Ochoa, the No. 1 women's golfer, is looking to break through and win her first major, in the field are several golfers with maybe other goals in mind.
Bouncing back
Defending champion Annika Sorenstam, right, said she's close to being fully recovered from a disc injury that kept her out for two months this year.
"I'm on the right track, " said Sorenstam, who has dropped to third in the world rankings behind Lorena Ochoa and Karrie Webb. "My neck is healing nicely, and I've been pain-free for seven or eight weeks now. So life is good."
As for returning to No. 1, Sorenstam said: "My priority right now is to get back to 100 percent. When that happens, we'll see."
By the numbers
12 Alexis Thompson's age, the youngest player ever to qualify for the Open.
23 Players in the field under the age of 20
47 Juli Inkster's age, the oldest player in the field.
71 Par on the course. It has been stretched some 400 yards. The fairways are generous. But the greens can be difficult to hold.
156 Players in the field.
Quotable
"I feel old out here, and I'm 26."
Suzann Pettersen, the dominant player in the majors this year with a runnerup finish at the Kraft Nabisco and a victory at the LPGA Championship
About that ending
For the first time, the Open will be decided by an aggregate playoff if more than one player is tied after 72 holes. In the past, an 18-hole Monday playoff was used to determine the winner. That is how Sorenstam won the title last year.
Now if there is a tie, the tournament will use the total of three holes. At Pine Needles, it will be the 16th, 17th and 18th holes.
"We concluded that we wanted to have the Women's Open, if at all possible, finish on a Sunday, " said David Fay, executive director of the United States Golf Association. "... We took a look at the number of people who were impacted. We took a look at television ..."
Fay was asked if the USGA will consider doing the same thing with the men's Open, which still uses an 18-hole playoff.
"We're not there, " Fay said. "To get into the explanation as to why would probably require a long discussion."
Tough words
Gary Gilchrist first started working with Michelle Wie when she was 12 and he was at the David Leadbetter Academy in Bradenton. Gilchrist moved on to a golf academy in South Carolina, and Wie moved on to Gilchrist's old boss, David Leadbetter. Things have not been going well for the 17-year-old phenom, who finished 35 strokes behind winner Suzann Pettersen at the LPGA Championship earlier this month. And it was no surprise to Gilchrist, who watched her hit balls that week.
"What I saw on the range the day before she teed off for her first round, I was absolutely blown away that she even teed it up the next day, " Gilchrist said. "I would've had to have had a few drinks before I teed off. She was hitting it everywhere. She couldn't hit a driver at all."
Wie broke her wrist this year and has struggled to regain her form.
Ochoa's major quest
Lorena Ochoa is only 25, in only her fifth year on the LPGA Tour. But she can no longer escape the question of when the No. 1 player in women's golf will win her first major.
"I'm ready, " the Mexican star has said at the start of each major, only to have something go wrong.
At the Kraft Nabisco, it was a quadruple bogey on the 17th hole of the third round. At the LPGA Championship three weeks ago, she never got on track, struggling to string together birdies.
Her next chance begins today at Pine Needles in the U.S. Women's Open.
It was two years ago at Cherry Hills when Ochoa, starting the final round an hour before the leaders, was on her way to 68 that would have given her the clubhouse lead, a score that would have set an intimidating target. But the nerves kicked in on the 18th tee, and her tee shot was combination duck-hook and popup, nowhere to go but the water. She finished with quadruple-bogey 8.
"I think I wasn't ready, " Ochoa said. "I'm ready today. I've been learning a lot in the past experiences. I made some big mistakes, but I think I'm ready to get a major. It will be amazing to get the U.S. Open. So now that we're here this week, why not win on Sunday?"
She is coming off her third victory of the season, winning in a playoff for the first time in her LPGA career.
If history is on her side, it's the fact that Pine Needles has crowned only the best as its champions. Annika Sorenstam won the Open in 1996 by hitting 51 of 56 fairways for a five-shot victory. Six years ago, Karrie Webb won by eight shots at Pine Needles, making her 5-for-8 in the majors.
Child's play
Alexis Thompson - at 12 years 4 months 18 days old - is the youngest player ever to qualify for the U.S. Women's Open, beating by a few months the record set by Boca Raton's Morgan Pressel when she qualified in 2001.
Thompson, a soon-to-be seventh-grader from Coral Springs, shot 72-71 to finish sixth at a 41-player sectional qualifier in Orlando. But all of this isn't new to the Thompson family. Her brother Nick, 24, plays on the Nationwide Tour and is second on the money list, all but assured of earning his PGA Tour card for 2008. And her brother Curtis, 14, is also an aspiring junior player.
"Growing up, they were both playing golf and they were an inspiration, " Thompson said. "My brothers were so good, and I want to be good, too. I started getting serious around 9 or 10, started playing tournaments, and saw I could be good at this game. It became serious golf at that point. Now I play against really good competition on really nice golf courses."
Nick went to Pine Needles this week after a top-10 finish on the Nationwide Tour. He helped his sister with yardages and strategy during practice rounds before heading to Erie, Pa., for his event.
"It is just special for her to be there, " Nick said. "I just want her to have fun. That's the main thing right now. For a 12-year-old to make it through local and sectional qualifying into the Open is pretty amazing - even though we knew she was capable."
Thompson is tall for her age at 5 feet 6, and she has the ability to hit her drives 240 yards and beyond. "I want to play well, " she said. "If I make the cut, that would be awesome, but I just want to do good."
Wie, Wie, Wie
This hasn't been the smoothest of years for Michelle Wie. It has featured injury (to her wrists), inactivity (she has completed only six official rounds) and insult (she offended Annika Sorenstam).
Throw in ignominy (Wie hasn't broken par in her past 20 rounds, dating to 2006), and it's clear that 2007 has been a year to forget.
Her right wrist already bothering her when she played in the PGA Tour's Sony Open in Hawaii in January, Wie broke a bone in her left wrist when she fell while jogging in February.
She was sidelined four months, returning at the Ginn Tribute Hosted by Annika Sorenstam in South Carolina in late May. She played 16 holes in the first round before withdrawing. She said her left wrist was the problem. Others noted she was two bogeys away from shooting 88, which, because of a rule aimed at tour nonmembers, would have resulted in her being banned from the tour for a year.
Two days later, Wie showed up in Maryland to begin practicing for the LPGA Championship. Sorenstam said, "There's a little lack of respect and class just to kind of leave a tournament like that and then come out and practice here."
On Tuesday, asked about her relationship with Sorenstam, Wie said only, "I haven't seen her yet."
"I said what I wanted to say and I stand for what I say and I still feel that way, " Sorenstam said.
Would an apology from Wie, who has said she doesn't feel she needs to apologize, be too little, too late?
"It's never too late, " Sorenstam said.