The “Stuck at Home With” series profiles players, caddies and staff in the women’s game who are making the most of an unprecedented break in tour life due to the coronavirus pandemic. New stories will be posted every Tuesday and Thursday.
Olafia Kristinsdottir’s niece, Viktoria, was born in March 2010. This year marked the first time Olafia was home in Iceland to celebrate. Finding such small silver linings in a time of crisis is key.
Of course, practice limitations are nothing new to Kristinsdottir, who at the 2016 Q-School became the first Icelandic player to qualify for the LPGA.
“I just broke the ice for everybody,” she once joked.
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It’s highly probable that Kristinsdottir played less than half the golf of her competitors growing up, simply due to daylight and weather restrictions. The outdoor season in Iceland spans from May to September. She always took off October entirely, even from indoor practice. Handball and badminton helped fill the gap.
It wasn’t until her German fiancé moved to Iceland that she even thought much about the dark months when he pined for sun. In mid-winter, there might be only four to five hours of daylight.
“It’s just normal to me,” she said.
Kristinsdottir’s popularity soared back home after she earned an LPGA card. In 2017, she was named Iceland’s Sportsperson of the Year. But in time, excess pressure and tournament golf ultimately took its toll. She needed to find better balance in life.
“It is different to represent such a small nation, where everybody is so proud of you for doing well,” she said. “You get a lot of media attention, which is also new for you. It’s a bit brutal sometimes, but those lessons you have to learn, and I think they make you a lot better.”
This season, the Wake Forest grad has committed her efforts to the Symetra Tour in hopes of regaining a full LPGA card. But with the competitive golf world on pause, Kristinsdottir is back home in Iceland, where her videos of chip shots off the ice into a red bucket look like something off a movie set.
So many people have asked Kristinsdottir about a travel itinerary for her homeland in recent years that she has thought about taking this time off to create several templates based on interests and personalities. Maybe include a list of vegan recommendations. Kristinsdottir even counts the iconic Blue Lagoon as a sponsor.
“It’s probably different than anything you’ve ever seen,” she said of the geothermal spa that, like much of the world, is currently closed.
There are no spa days in Kristinsdottir’s immediate future, but there is plenty of golf practice and mental training. In addition to her work with Vision54, she recently finished the audio book: “The Obstacle is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph.” Certainly a timely book during a global pandemic.
When the winter-like weather allows, Kristinsdottir likes to practice outside at the Golf Club of Reykjavík. Otherwise, there’s a high-tech indoor facility three minutes away that has nine TrackMan bays as well as chipping and putting areas. At one time, operators restricted the facility to a 20-person maximum and enforced strict sanitizing efforts before eventually closing.
Now she takes her own TrackMan to a friend’s garage around 11 a.m. each morning and gets to work at his indoor net. She’ll stay there for four to five hours daily, though she did take off Easter Sunday.
It wasn’t that long ago that Kristinsdottir felt lost with her golf swing. In some ways, this extra time to groove swing changes might prove critical in the long run.
“I’ve always had these test scores to compare how I’m doing over the years,” she said of her TrackMan. “In Evian 2017 was the last time I got a test score over 95. Now, I’ve been getting more in the 90s, and I broke the 95 wall. … Something is right.”
Chances are Kristinsdottir will still be in Iceland when those 24/7 summer nights kick in, a phenomenon known as the Midnight Sun. There were times growing up that she’d tee off as late as 11 p.m. with friends.
In the middle of a tournament, she’d often come home after a round, have dinner and relax a bit before heading back out to the course around 9 p.m. to practice and prepare for the next day.
“It was quite handy,” she said.
To most of us, remarkable too.
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