ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — Stacy Lewis is again sitting on the high desk of the media room, answering a belated query from somebody too shy to shout over the gusts of wind throughout the press convention.
Her five-year-old daughter Chesnee desires to know if she will be able to get a swimming pool — “an enormous one” — if her mum wins right here, as she did in 2013.
“I believe I’d have the ability to kind you out, girlie,” says Lewis.
Eleven years have handed for the reason that Texan shot birdie-birdie on the ultimate two holes to clinch the Girls’s Open by two pictures. The second shot into 17 stays the perfect of her profession, a lot in order that the 5-iron is the one membership she has saved for her workplace.
However in that point, as motherhood has usurped golf in her checklist of priorities and made her much less tunnel-visioned, the calls for of the LPGA Tour have turn into much more all-consuming.
This yr’s tour began with two Florida occasions and ends with one other three within the Sunshine State. The intervening 10 months? A map of tangled zig-zags throughout the US, Canada, Europe and Asia that might not look misplaced in Chesnee’s college jotter.
This week’s Open is the fifth main in as many months, not together with the Olympic Video games at France’s Le Golf Nationwide earlier this month. St. Andrews closes the majors season, however with the Solheim Cup in September and one other Pacific leg this fall visiting China, South Korea, Malaysia, Japan and Hawaii within the house of simply 35 days, the schedule is rammed and never ending anytime quickly.
We solely ask an important questions on this press convention!!!
Chesnee requested mother @Stacy_Lewis if she might get a swimming pool 🥰😂 pic.twitter.com/bhqgapR1Yz
— LPGA (@LPGA) August 21, 2024
Throughout the 33 mixed LPGA Tour stops and majors this yr, there are greater than 215 hours of pure flying time. The general mileage provides as much as greater than three journeys all over the world.
This isn’t a brand new drawback — final yr’s schedule included a record-breaking 18 events with greater than 2,000 miles between tour stops. This season there was the journey to China and intra-continental visits to Thailand and Malaysia; criss-crossing from west coast Los Angeles to east coast New Jersey in Might; June’s see-sawing from Michigan to the PGA Championship in Washington state and again once more to Michigan, two six-hour flights with simply 4 days relaxation in between every.
Eight-and-a-half months into the season, with winds of 40-45 mph forecast for Thursday and plenty of gamers having not been in a position to play the Scottish Open to reacquaint themselves with hyperlinks golf, can it’s anticipated that any participant is on the high of their recreation? “In all probability not, no,” stated Lewis, who’s Workforce USA’s captain for the Solheim Cup in Virginia subsequent month. “Those that performed the Olympics, you discuss to most of them and it’s simply emotionally so taxing that week. So no, our schedule, particularly Olympic years, is absolutely, actually powerful.
“There’s been a whole lot of discuss of schedule recently but additionally on the identical time, I’ve been doing this for 15 or 16 years. You learn to cope with it, and also you learn to be prepared in these moments and actually simply do the perfect you possibly can.”
GO DEEPER
The Girls’s Open is at St. Andrews. The Previous Course is able to problem the sphere
Since 2009, the purse on the Girls’s Open has elevated from $2.2 million to $9 million, a 409 per cent enhance — tripling since AIG began sponsoring the event in 2020.
Lewis described the advance in infrastructure and amenities on the Girls’s Open as “evening and day” in comparison with 2013 however believes their palms are tied relating to discovering methods to ease the gruelling schedule.
“I believe that’s the perfect however a whole lot of it’s when do sponsors wish to play and when can we get the golf programs?” she stated.
“We don’t have the luxurious of the PGA Tour that claims, ‘We’re supplying you with X quantity of {dollars} and we’re enjoying this week.’ We don’t have the cash to simply throw round.
“We’re sort of on the mercy of sponsors. We’re on the mercy of golf programs and it’s the character of the place we’re. Would we prefer to be higher? Yeah, completely. I believe our staff behind the scenes works like loopy on it however we’re a world tour, and I wish to compete towards the perfect gamers each week.
“So to try this, we’ve bought to go play in Thailand as a result of we now have gamers from Thailand. We’re going to go play in Korea as a result of we now have gamers from Korea. I believe that’s simply the character of it. It’s extra entering into your head, to me, that this can be a world tour. You say you’re going to go play on the LPGA Tour, that is additionally what you signed up for.”
World primary Nelly Korda, having received six tournaments in seven begins between January and Might, together with the Chevron Championship, has earned greater than $3 million this yr in prize cash.
That enables her the luxurious of skipping the complete Asia swing, a seven-week lay-off early within the yr that was sandwiched between her profitable streak. However even the two-time main winner needed to withdraw from the JM Eagle LA Championship in April, citing exhaustion.
Nelly Korda has taken frequent weeks off this season, a luxurious not all LPGA professionals can afford. (Michael Reaves / Getty Photos)
Lexi Thompson opened up the dialog across the psychological and bodily calls for of the LPGA Tour in Might when she introduced she was retiring on the finish of the season, aged simply 29.
She spoke about how “lonely” and all-consuming life on tour has been since she certified for her first U.S. Open at 12 however believes there are methods the load might be lessened.
“The schedule for certain,” stated Thompson. “I believe all of the journey will get lots. I believe the move of schedule might be higher. Sure occasions might be back-to-back which are shut to one another. We journey lots in another country however it’s a world tour in order that comes with it, and we’re very fortunate for the sponsors that we now have exterior the nation.
“There’s a little much less weight on my shoulders after the announcement as a result of it has been on my thoughts for just a few years, so it’s one thing that’s been inside that no one actually knew about or what was going to occur.”
Catriona Matthew claimed her solely main on the Open in 2009, profitable at Royal Lytham & St Annes simply 11 weeks after giving start. Now 54 years outdated and making her final look at her house event, Matthew doesn’t understand how she managed to tour together with her two kids within the following years.
To maintain chasing one other main in a subject so deep Lewis counts 60 per cent as having the potential to win requires supreme resilience.
Lydia Ko is trying to finish an eight-and-a-half-year main drought this week however the Australian is available in scorching after profitable gold in Paris, turning into the thirty fifth lady to be inducted into the LPGA Corridor of Fame.
She stays the youngest feminine to ever win on the LPGA Tour after her triumph at 15 years outdated, however 12 years later there was a direct dose of realism about how lengthy she is keen to beat the sore backs she experiences within the morning — and whether or not she might deliver ahead her deliberate retirement at 30.
“In methods, it may be scary as a result of I’ve performed golf since I used to be 5,” stated Ko.
“That is my life whether or not I prefer it or not and golf has given me a lot for me to be grateful for on and off the golf course.
“As a lot as we’re very grateful to have the ability to do what we love and compete at a excessive stage, I believe there may be the opposite facet of issues that it’s a must to contemplate. As somebody that’s possibly nearer to that time in my profession than once I was a rookie, you come to understand all of these items, and also you respect the participant for the choice that she got here up with.”
There are gamers nonetheless decided to affix the majors membership, most notably England’s Charley Hull whose perspective in the direction of a latest shoulder harm captures the mindset wanted to deal with this relentless schedule.
“My shoulder simply bought a little bit bit tight so I’ve acupuncture in it each different day as a result of when it’s chilly, it will probably play up a bit,” she stated.
“I’ve bought degenerate arthritis in it, as properly. So when it does get chilly, it will get a bit stiff. I simply attempt to hold it heat.
“Other than that, I’m wholesome and able to go.”
(Prime photograph: Luke Walker / Getty Photos)
