NEWS AND NOTES FROM THE LADIES EUROPEAN TOURWebb credits new attitude in return to winning waysWith her fifth victory at the ANZ Ladies Masters, Australia’s Karrie Webb admitted that is was a change in attitude which helped her back to her top form. The winner of 32 individual tournaments in her career, six major championships and a Super-Career Grand Slam after winning all five of the modern majors and twice a winner of the Player of the Year and Vare Trophy titles on the LPGA Tour, Webb began the 2005 season with a huge boost in confidence before she heads back to the USA for her 11th season as a professional. “I’ve probably worked harder over the last couple of years than I have ever worked on the Tour and I’ve changed my attitude a bit but I wouldn’t say I’m any less intense,” said Webb, who when she chipped in for a crucial eagle three at the third hole to reel in Ai Miyazato during the final round of the ANZ Ladies Masters, fell to her knees and cheered, which some of her critics say she never does enough. "Every now and then, (I show emotion) I don't keep my emotions in on purpose. I just think that's how I naturally react to things. It was a huge shot, I was just hoping to get it up and down and it went in. So I was very, very happy about that." In her glory years of 2000 and 2001, Webb was simply brilliant on the course and some say lacking charisma off it. Webb was highly critical of her performances, like many top sports personalities at the top of their trade, but to say she was dull and dour is a misnomer as Webb is one of the most laid back, friendly players you could possibly meet. She is always willing to promote tournaments in which she competes. She offers a smile to everyone she meets, spends time with the people she needs to and despite some insidious and intrusive questioning from the media, Webb gives them the fuel they need to sell their papers. “I try not to be so hard on myself nowadays and I think the difference is that each week I don’t see it as a life and death situation and I know that to have a long career, I couldn’t possibly keep up the intensity. I used to be so hard on myself and I think that fired me up to play well, but I don’t respond to that as well and the criticism I give to myself. “I actually stopped listening to it. I’m still hard on myself but as I get older it’s less and less every year hopefully.” Webb, who only won once in 2004 and in 2003, is now looking forward to this year and with regular coaching from both Ian Triggs and Kelvin Haller, the 30-year-old from Ayr is now beginning to make the putts that agonisingly slipped by over the last two seasons. At Royal Pines, she improved each day on the greens and after changing her putter after a lacklustre first round of 33 putts, Webb racked up 32, then 30 and needed just 28 on the last day to win her fifth title on the Gold Coast. “Towards the end of last year, it was my putting but I felt very comfortable on the golf course as far as my swing was concerned and I hit the ball well, especially for the last five or six tournaments of the year, but I just didn’t make the putts,” she said. “But for the most part, I didn’t putt nearly as well as I have done in the past so obviously I’ve been working hard on that. “But the biggest lesson I have learned over the last couple of years is that there is a fine line in this game. You can be so close and even in that last stretch of tournaments at the end of the year I only really had to ask for one or two shots each round, four shots over the course of the tournament and I could have won two or three of them. “When I had that really hot stretch for a couple of years I got that extra shot per day and didn’t struggle with that so it’s a really fine line. I feel my game is a work in progress but I feel confident the way things are and the way I’m heading and I think in a year or two if I want to, I could go back to the way I was a few years ago. “I haven’t gone through what some people go through, it’s just been a slower period than what I was accustomed to but last year, I’ve probably enjoyed the process more than I did when I was playing well. “I think things happened to me at such a young age that it just progressively got better that I just expected it to happen and I thought I was appreciating it but I don’t think I was. I just thought that was meant to happen to me. “I always questioned why it was happening to me but I just thought it was meant to happen to me. When it wasn’t, I had to rethink things, more than I did when I was 21 or 22. But last year, I probably enjoyed the process more than ever. If I want to play for another five or ten years I need to have that (enjoyment) or there wouldn’t be much point being out there.” The point worth noting is that she is still out there, back to her best form and Karrie Webb has a new attitude to her game and a putting stroke reminiscent of her deadly best, 2005 could be the year that Webb has women’s golf in a spin again. Stupples learned from watching AnnikaThis time last season, Karen Stupples was flying under the radar of world media coverage as she played most of her golf on the LPGA Tour. But after a runner’s up spot behind a rampant Annika Sorenstam at the 2004 ANZ Ladies Masters, the 31-year-old from Deal in Kent admitted that she received a lesson in being greedy after playing with the Swedish superstar over the final two rounds. It was a lesson she heeded as Stupples went on to win twice in 2004, which included her dramatic major championship victory in front of her home fans at Sunningdale in Berkshire at the Weetabix Women’s British Open. “I learned a lot from watching her play,” said Stupples, who became only the third English player to win a major after Laura Davies and Alison Nicholas. “Once Annika has got the tournament by the throat she doesn’t want to let it go. She just keeps pounding away and wants to make more and more birdies and I think I learned a valuable lesson from that. She was playing to get as many under par for herself. She wasn’t doing it for anyone else or to do anything other than to be as good as she could.” Stupples has set herself some tough goals and is planning on more successes this year including her maiden appearance for Europe in The Solheim Cup at Crooked Stick in September. And after a rigorous fitness regime over the winter months, Stupples appeared in her first full field event of the season looking slimmer and feeling stronger. “I like to think I hit it a bit straighter nowadays and that’s where I have tried putting a lot of my energies. The fact that I was a little wayward, it used to get me into big trouble at times. “This year, I would really like to decrease my scoring average by a shot and my goal is to get it under 70, so I’m aiming for 69 point something this year and that would be ideal for me. “To do that, a little bit of short game work needs to be done, but I have spent a lot of time in the gym, so I’m actually at this moment in time find out how far I am hitting my shots because I think I’ve gained a little bit of distance. “Last year my driving average was about 265-yards and I carry the ball through the air comfortably 240-245-yards and now it’s 245-255 through the air.” With a first experience in The Solheim Cup a high priority, barring something bizarre meaning she won’t make the team either by right or via a captain’s pick, it would appear that Catrin Nilsmark may have found the perfect partner for Laura Davies. Stupples suggested they would make a good pairing after their performance in the recent Women’s World Cup of Golf in South Africa. “We had a fantastic week together,” she added. “I think the foursomes were our strongest suit out of the three formats and hopefully, with the Solheim Cup coming up, potentially we might form a good partnership there.” The good news for LET fans is that Stupples will be playing a long stretch during the summer which will include the Ladies English Open in her own back yard at Chart Hills is Kent, the Evian Masters, the Swedish Open and of course, returning to Royal Lytham and St Annes GC where she aims to defend her first major championship. A message to the Blondes who took me to see BlondieOne of the ‘Rules for living’ on the LET is that you need to let your hair down and start ‘Living in the real world’, so if you can, ‘Picture this’ - A night out with six of the top Swedish players on just before the start of the ANZ Ladies Masters to go and see the ‘Platinum Blonde’ American Deborah Harry in concert at the Gold Coast Convention Centre. Having heard that the ‘Sunday Girl’ was in town, ‘One way or another’, I had to get a ticket to see my favourite childhood punk rock star and out of the Union City Blue came ‘Maria’ Hjorth, who said that she would be ‘Touched by your presence, dear’ if I would come along and not ‘Fade away’ and watch the ‘Angels on the balcony’ from my hotel room, which at times can be an ‘Island of lost souls’ after a busy day at work. ‘I didn’t have the nerve to say no’ and instead of ‘Hanging on the telephone’ waiting for the box office to ring me, five minutes later Charlotta Sörenstam said ‘Call me’ as she had a spare ticket to see my heroine ‘In the flesh’. I thought they had hearts of gold not a ‘Heart of glass’ when they took me to see the ‘Atomic’ singer in the company of five more ‘Faces’ I knew well; Asa Gottmo, Helena Alterby, Maria Boden and Emma Zachrisson, who in a ‘Tribute’ to the ‘Native New Yorker’, complimented the ‘Background melody’ with foot tapping, finger clicking and plenty of ‘Boom Boom in the Zoom Zoom room’ of the concert hall. ‘The Jam was movin’ all night and Blondie had us all in ‘Rapture’ as she belted out a few classic tunes from her heyday. This ‘English Boy’ spent most of the evening as a ‘Happy Dog’ and ‘Dreaming’ of the provocative poster I had on my bedroom wall when I was in my early teens. Debbie Harry was simply ‘Divine’ and nobody was in a big ‘Rush Rush’ to leave and we all got home well before ‘11.59’. I was desperately trying to find ‘The right words’ to say to my Swedish friends for taking me. I thought I’d be ‘The last one in the World’ you’d ask out to a gig, but ‘Here’s looking at you’. The whole night was ‘Magic’. Martin Park Stupples explains that Tour life takes toll on relationshipsEngland’s Karen Stupples explained that living a life on a golf tour is extremely hard on personal relationships. The Weetabix Women’s British Open champion admitted that her marriage had suffered as a consequence of being away from home so much and living a life which is far from normal. With many top golfers having their private life scrutinised by the media such as Colin Montgomerie, Nick Faldo and with the recent news of Annika Sörenstam’s divorce announcement, Stupples put the subject of personal relationships into perspective. “It’s all through the men’s tour and now it’s through the women’s tour, too,” said Stupples who put the record straight that she was separated form her husband, David. “It’s part of life in this day and age. It’s the pressures of life. As individuals we are all very selfish people at the end of the day and that’s why we play golf. “If we were team orientated, we would go on to play netball, field hockey, soccer and any other team sports. But we didn’t, we all chose to play golf, which is about as solitary game as you could possibly find. “Even if you went on to play tennis you still need a partner to play against. You couldn’t go on out there on your own and power balls, someone needs to hit them at you. So, it’s a very solitary game and that’s where it all comes from.” But in a dose of priceless Stupples humour, she laughed off the question suggesting that women golfers were impossible to live with. “I think it takes a very special person to meet and get involved with and deal with the life we lead. It’s not a normal life and I don’t think any professional golfer can say that they have a normal life. “We don’t wake up in the same house every week, we don’t get up for work and travel to a regular job and take the kids to school. One week we’re on one city, the next week we are in another city and the only familiarity is that we may have been to that city the year before. “We may have stayed in the same hotel and I try and stay in the same hotel chain each week. I find it nice to stick to the same hotel chain and get some kind of regularity in my life. I actually try and get to do some of the silly things like laundry because it’s “normal”, because what else is normal about it?” Teenagers breaking all the records as the future looks rosyEveryone is aware that the future of golf lies in the youth making a breakthrough, but early in 2005, the teenage invasion in women’s golf reached fever pitch. First up at the ANZ Ladies Masters was 19-year-old Japanese sensation Ai Miyazato, who equalled Karrie Webb’s course record of nine-under par 63 at Royal Pines resort and the following day, 18-year-old Tiffany Joh from the USA recorded an albatross two at the par five ninth hole to complete a 63 and add her name to the course record list. Joh, who plays her golf in the AJGA (American Junior Golf Association) events in the USA, finished her first professional event in a tie for 13th on seven under par with rounds of 73, 63, 73 and 72. And despite being just 16-years-old and 5’1” tall, Taiwanese junior Ya Ni Tseng finished in a tie for 25th on five under par with rounds of 70, 69, 73 and 71 in her first LET appearance. And over in Hawaii, 15-year-old Michelle Wie, arguably the most famous amateur in the game, finished tied second on the LPGA behind Jennifer Rosales at the SBS Open at Turtle Bay and it’s only a matter of time, it would appear that Wie will win her first event. Last season, Minea Blomqvist from Finland became the third youngest player to win an event on the LET at 19-years and 129 days when she won at the OTP Bank Central European Open. Blomqvist went on to win the Ryder Cup Wales Rookie of the Year award. After fending off Miyazato with a final round 67 to win the ANZ Masters by a shot, Karrie Webb - who at the tender age of just 30 must feel a little antiquated in present company - admitted that she felt lucky to beat the teenager, who she said has all the attributes to become one of the world’s finest golfers. “I feel lucky that I’ve got one up on her now because in the future, she’s going to be a big star,” said Webb, a former World number one and five times a winner of the ANZ Ladies Masters. “I actually played with her in Japan at the end of last year where she won that tournament. She’s just an incredible talent and she’s done so much for women’s golf in Japan and electrified it over there and wherever she goes there are a bout 30 media about six feet behind her all the time. “She’s a great kid and she really makes an effort to speak English and I know she is trying hard with that so she can go to the States at the end of the year and she’s a really exciting prospect and someone to watch out for.” Miyazato, if we are to rely on the evidence of the other teenage performances of late, is not the only one to watch out for. Johnson and Arricau receive invites to Kraft Nabisco ChampionshipEngland’s Trish Johnson and Stephanie Arricau from France make up two of the international invitations for this year’s first major, the Kraft Nabisco Championship, held at Mission Hills Country Club in Arizona. Johnson finished second on the Robe di Kappa Ladies European Tour (LET) order of merit behind Laura Davies in 2004 and is a six-time member of the European Solheim Cup Team. Arricau won twice on the LET last year and finished third in the order of merit and this year is her rookie season on the LPGA Tour. Making up the remainder of the international invitations is Japan's teenage sensation Ai Miyazato, who teamed with Rui Kitada to help Japan claim the inaugural Women's World Cup of Golf at Fancourt. Miyazato won five events on the Japan Ladies Professional Golf Association (JLPGA) and became the first teenager to earn 100 million yen in one season. Joining Miyazato will be compatriot Yuri Fudoh, who was the top-ranked player on the JLPGA last year. Fudoh will be making her third appearance in the event with her best finish being a tie for 45th in 2002. The event takes place from March 24-27 with a prize fund of $1.8million over the Par 72 6520-yard course and Grace Park from Korea will be defending her title. Vandals hit ANZ Ladies MastersIn an act of shocking vandalism, an unknown chemical substance has been directly sprayed onto three of the greens at Royal Pines Resort, home of the ANZ Ladies Masters for the past 16 years. The greens were attacked late on Sunday evening with a poison. Stuart Laing, the Greens Superintendent at Royal Pines could not grasp why anyone would wish to decimate his course, of which residents of the Gold Coast are extremely proud. “Vandalism won’t stop Royal Pines from rolling out a world class course and we look forward to another successful tournament, despite this set back,” said Laing. Miyazato Ai’s up world number one spot19-year-old Japanese sensation Ai Miyazato admitted on the eve of the $Aus800,000 ANZ Ladies Masters that she wants to become the world number one woman golfer and replace her golfing idol Annika Sörenstam at the top of the rankings. With a fast start to her fledgling career, it’s not just wishful thinking. Miyazato, who won the inaugural Women’s World Cup of Golf at Fancourt in South Africa alongside playing partner Rui Kitada, is already a sporting icon in her homeland and everywhere she goes, there is a massive media contingent from the written press, radio and television. So much so that over half of the media centre at the ANZ Ladies Masters was occupied by the Japanese contingent and in addition, a crew of over 20 television staff arrived at Royal Pines to film a documentary on her meteoric rise to stardom. And Miyazato’s first appearance in Australia caused a distinct shortage of accommodation in Surfers Paradise as her compatriots flocked from the winter of Japan to the sunshine of the Gold Coast to see her compete against some of the world’s top golfers such as Karrie Webb, Laura Davies, Karen Stupples and Rachel Hetherington. Miyazato is, according to her manager Yuji ‘Dave’ Otsuka, “bigger than David Beckham” in Japan and her face adorns many billboards across the country. She has boosted the popularity of women's golf in the ‘Land of the Rising Sun’ and such is and despite her diminutive 5’2” stature, she is metaphorically even bigger than Tiger Woods. Last November when Woods won the Dunlop Phoenix tournament in Japan, Miyazato was winning on the Japan LPGA. The events went head-to-head and her TV ratings easily out-rated those of Woods. She stars in many television adverts including one for Suntory, the beer and whisky distributors, one of her main sponsors. However, somewhat incongruously, it is not legal to drink in Japan until the age of 20. Miyazato became a household name when she won her first pro tournament at the Miyagi Cup in 2003 as an amateur and then turned professional and won five more times in her rookie season on the LPGA Tour of Japan. She posted a total of 16 top-ten finishes and earned more than 115million Yen in 2004, making her the first sports teenager in Japan to pass that earnings milestone. This year, Miyazato has already notched up the biggest win of her young career and is making plans to raid the coffers of the LPGA Tour as soon as she can. Thanks to her performances, she has been granted an exemption for the first women’s major championship of the year, the Kraft Nabisco Championship in March.
“The World Cup was my biggest win and I’ll never forget that week. I have my card in Japan for this year, so I’ll try for the LPGA in America in 2006,” said Miyazato, who grew up in Higashison on the north side of Okinawa. “The LPGA is a very competitive tour and I think I might need to improve a little more. I want to be like Annika and I think about that a lot. I’m not sure how long it will take me to get to be world number one and I think I will need to be lucky, too.” Despite her stardom, Miyazato says she can still walk the streets in her hometown of Okinawa and go shopping without being hassled by her adoring fans. “But sometimes, I need to wear a hat,” she giggled. And like most modern teenagers, she is a big fan of music and movies. But she confessed that she does not like Japanese music, preferring the rock sounds of American band ‘Green Day’. “Oh, and I really like Brad Pitt,” she confessed. “My favourite movie is Troy, it’s so cool.” Miyazato took up golf at the age of four, inspired by her father, Masuru, who is a golf instructor and her two elder brothers, Yusaku and Kiyoshi, who play on the Japanese men's tour. Despite her lack of height, she has an excellent power to weight ratio as she consistently hits her drives over 250-yards and her lowest score as a professional is 63. Not only does she have her eye on the World number one spot in years to come, she also wants to win a major championship, something that no Japanese player has ever done. With her ability and with the right support network around her, it would come as little surprise to anyone. When she does and wherever she goes next it might be worth building a new town to cope with the entourage she brings with her. Luna Landing in Abu DhabiDiana Luna from Italy will leave behind the lush and verdant courses of the southern hemisphere in her early season schedule and will head to Abu Dhabi to become the first women to participate in the World Sand Golf Championship, which takes place on March 7th 2005. Luna, who represented Italy at the inaugural Women’s World Cup of Golf last week in South Africa, will depart after next week’s ANZ Ladies Masters at Royal Pines GC on Queensland’s Gold Coast and head to the desert to compete alongside her male counterparts including Ryder Cup stars Colin Montgomerie, Paul McGinley and Miguel Angel Jimenez. The glamorous 22-year-old from Rome, winner of last year’s Tenerife Ladies Open on the Robe di Kappa Ladies European Tour, is relishing the chance of playing sand golf almost as much as having the opportunity to take on some of the best men in the world. “I am really looking forward to the double challenge of sand golf and taking on the boys! I have never played on sand before, but it sounds crazy,” said Luna who will swap the slick and smooth grass putting surfaces of normal golf to play on ‘browns’, a mixture of sand and oil, which offers a surprisingly good putting surface. After a successful inaugural event in 2004, an all-star cast of 24 European Tour professionals including Luna, return to Al Ghazal Golf Course. The par 71, 6600 yard course will be a challenging experience for all concerned and they are sure to be tested by the famous ‘browns’ characterised by their uniquely true and fast roll. The inaugural event in 2004 captured the imagination of the golfing fraternity around the globe with event coverage reaching over 30 countries worldwide. Martin Park Media Director LADIES EUROPEAN TOUR The Old Hall, Dorchester Way Macclesfield, Cheshire SK10 2LQ England Tel. +44 (0) 1625 611444 Mobile. +44 (0)7971 986855 Fax. +44 (0) 1625 610406 mpark@ladieseuropeantour.com
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