Tag: Symetra Tour

Epson Tour: New ‘Road to the LPGA’ sponsor deal supports players with higher purses, lower fees and new ambassador program

The new partnership is centered around supporting players on their journey through professional golf.

On Wednesday the LPGA announced a five-year deal with Epson to make the tech company the title sponsor of the “Road to the LPGA” qualifying tour, formerly known as the Symetra Tour.

Embarking on its 42nd season of competition, the newly-named Epson Tour will award LPGA membership to the top-10 players on the Race for the Card money list at the end of each season.

The new partnership is centered around supporting players on their journey through professional golf. The level for minimum purses has been raised to $200,000 while player-entry fees will be lowered by 10% per tournament (as much as $1,000 per player for the year). Not only that, the yearly Epson Tour Ambassador Program that officially launches in 2022 will grant $10,000 to each of the 2021 Epson Tour graduates to help aid their move to the LPGA.

The full 2022 schedule will be announced in February but will begin March 4-6 in Winter Haven, Florida, with the 2022 Florida’s Natural Charity Classic at the Country Club of Winter Haven.

“It’s really incredible to see the impact that Epson is making right from the start of their partnership with the LPGA. They aren’t just putting their name on the Epson Tour, but truly walking the walk and backing women’s futures,” said Fatima Fernandez Cano, an Epson Tour graduate in 2020 and 2021 and the first representative of the Epson Tour Ambassador Program. “I can’t thank Epson enough for believing in me. When I came to America from Spain to play college golf at Troy, these types of moments were a dream. Now it’s reality and I’m in a better position because of Epson.”

“We don’t only want to put our name on the Epson Tour; we want to find a way to invest in players chasing their dream of the LPGA Tour and support them once that dream becomes a reality, through the Epson Tour Ambassador Program,” said Kendra Jones, Vice President Legal Affairs and General Counsel, Epson America, Inc. “We hope other companies will join us as we empower women through the DEI Partnership in cooperation with the LPGA.”

With the DEI Partnership, Epson and the LPGA are challenging at least four other companies to join them to help cut player-entry fees in half from $500- to $250. Organizations who partner up will receive pro-am teams and signage at tournaments.

In the last decade, the Epson Tour has grown from 15 tournaments and $1.6 million in prize money to 20-plus tournaments and more than $4 million to be awarded in 2022. Over the last seven years, the tour has graduated 65 players from 21 countries. Former Epson Tour graduates include current world No. 1 Nelly Korda, Inbee Park, Lorena Ochoa and Hannah Green.

“We are delighted to welcome Epson to the LPGA Tour family. This ground-breaking partnership will provide expanded opportunities for the future stars of the game from around the globe to test their talent and take one step closer to realizing their dreams,” said commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan. “We are grateful that Epson shares our commitment to supporting young female athletes as they grow and develop and to playing an active role in the growth and equity in women’s sports. The ‘Road to the LPGA’ has never been better.”

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Meet the 10 Symetra Tour graduates who earned LPGA cards for 2022

This group includes a U.S. Women’s Amateur winner, an NCAA champ and a certified yoga instructor.

Heading into the Symetra Tour Championship, the 20th event on this year’s schedule, six players had already wrapped up LPGA cards for the 2022 season. Four more followed after the 72-hole event at LPGA International.

From 1999-2002, the official qualifying tour of the LPGA handed out three cards. Then from 2003-2007, that number increased to five before 10 were distributed starting in 2008.

Here are the top 10 players from the 2021 Money List:

1. Lilia Vu, 23, Fountain Valley, California, $162,292 ­– A three-time winner in 2021, former UCLA standout also notched five additional top-5 finishes this season on the Symetra Tour to win Player of the Year honors. Won eight titles as a Bruin. Wasn’t all that long that Vu considering quitting golf, but mom kept her going.

 2. Fatima Fernandez Cano, 25, Santiago de Compostela, Spain, $119,180 – Didn’t win on the Symetra Tour but posted seven top-5 finishes. Came into the final event leading the tour in birdies. Won eight titles at Troy University.

 3. Casey Danielson, 26, Osceola, Wisconsin, $114,534 – A two-time winner this season, Danielson wrapped up the season with a runner-up showing at Tour Championship. Member of the 2015 NCAA-winning Stanford team. Certified yoga instructor.

 4. Sophia Schubert, 25, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, $101,163 – Won first Symetra Title in penultimate event to secure her card, capping a stretch of six top-10 finishes. Texas grad won the 2017 U.S. Women’s Amateur.

5. Ruixin Liu, 22, Guangdong, People’s Republic of China, $95,281 – Two-time winner this season who played in only 13 of the tour’s 20 events. Boasts six career victories on the developmental tour. Won the 2018 Symetra Tour Player of the Year Award. Made three starts on the LPGA this season, finishing T-16 at the Pure Silk.

6. Maude-Aimee Leblanc, 32, Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada, $94,188 – Three runner-up showing in 2021. Came into the final event leading the tour in scoring at 70.13. Top five in both putting categories. Helped Purdue win the 2010 NCAA title.

7. Amanda Doherty, 24, Atlanta, $90,921 – Florida State grad finished the season in a share of third at the Tour Championship for her eighth top-10 finish. Leads Symetra tour in putts per greens in regulation. Named Gaelle Truet Rookie of the Year.

8. Allison Emrey, 28, Charlotte, $82,644 – Won once to go along with five additional top 10s. Wake Forest grad earns her card after six seasons on the Symetra Tour. Best previous finish on the money list was 14th last year.

9. Morgane Metraux, 24, Lausanne, Switzerland, $75,771 – Notched her first Symetra victory in June at the Island Resort Championship to earn a spot in the Amundi Evian. Chose to play skip the Tokyo Olympics to fulfill a dream of playing the Evian. Sister Kim, who also played at Florida State, competes on the Ladies European Tour.

10. Rachel Rohanna, 30, Marianna, Pennsylvania, $75,608 – Busy mom to daughter Gemelia makes her way back to the LPGA thanks to a hot stretch in July that included three top-three finishes. Ranks first on tour in eagles. Family runs a cattle ranch in Pennsylvania.

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It’s Lilia Vu all over again: Former UCLA star captures Four Winds Invitational for third Symetra victory

Vu used a 60-yard chip-in for eagle 3 on the 495-yard, par-5 12th hole to pull away to victory No. 3.

SOUTH BEND, Indiana —To paraphrase the late sports philosopher, Lawrence Peter “Yogi” Berra, it was Lilia Vu all over again in Sunday’s final round of the Symetra Tour’s $200,000 Four Winds Invitational at South Bend Country Club.

Vu, a former UCLA All-American and 2018 U.S. Curtis Cup team member and the tour’s leading money winner with two victories coming into this week, used a 60-yard chip-in for eagle 3 on the 495-yard, par-5 12th hole by railroad tracks to pull away to victory No. 3.

“I know it’s really important to hit the fairway on that hole so I have a good angle to the green,” Vu said. “I had 230 (yards) to the pin. The hole does play longer (into the wind) so I ended up just short on the fringe. My caddie (Don Bavaro) and I were thinking (the chip) was going to be left to right, but for some reason I wanted to hit it straight. Deep down, I wanted to make this chip because I was hearing the cheers (from the other holes). I hit the chip and it went in.”

Bavaro, a long-time professional caddie from Chicago who has been carrying Vu’s clubs the last two years, said the chip was hit hard and fortunately hit the flagstick and dropped for the eagle which gave Vu the lead for good.

“It was pretty assertive,” Vu quipped.

Vu then added a 33-foot birdie putt on the 388-yard, par-4 16th hole which plays over South Chain Lake and parred Nos. 17 and 18 to finish off her five-under 67 – her 11th straight sub-par round in Symetra Tour events – and a 12-under winning total of 204.

“I’ve just been trying to have fun; Don and I are a good team,” Vu said after finishing two strokes ahead of China’s 22-year-old Ruixin Liu, who closed with a 67 which included eight birdies, four on each nine, to offset three bogeys. Liu, who started the season with a pair of victories, earned $19.363 for second place and moved into second place with $95,281.

Third place at nine-under 207 went to Australia’s 23-year-old Robyn Choi, who closed with a round of 68 that included seven birdies and three bogeys. Choi earned $14,102 for her first Top 10 finish of the year. Last season, she finished three times in the Top 10, including a runner-up to Kim Kaufman at the Four Winds Invitational last September when it was held at Blackthorn.

Neither Liu nor Choi were made available to the local television and print media by tournament officials following their rounds.

Vu began the round in third place at seven-under 137 behind 29-year-old Demi Runas of Torrance, California, a Symetra journeywoman looking for her first-ever tour victory, and France’s 21-year-old Pauline Roussin-Bouchard, who was playing in her first tournament as a professional after giving up her amateur eligibility at the University of South Carolina. Runas started at nine-under and Roussin-Bouchard was one stroke back.

But both Runas and Roussin-Bouchard struggled from the start, opening the door for Choi, Liu and Vu to make up ground. Runas bogeyed four of her first six holes before righting herself with birdies at Nos. 7 and 8. She finished with a closing 75 that left her tied for eighth.

Roussin-Bouchard bogeyed three of her first five holes but countered with three birdies on the back nine to close with an even-par 72 and eight-under 208 total which left her tied for fourth with Sweden’s Elin Arvidsson, earning $9,906 for her first professional check.

Meanwhile, Vu began making her move after starting with four straight pars. She then birdied the par-5, 513-yard fifth that doglegs right around South Chain Lake, the first of three birdies on the front that helped her offset a bogey at No. 6.

“The course was super difficult today,” Vu said of South Bend Country Club, which got firmer each day of the tournament after Mother Nature dumped more than eight inches of rain on its turf. “The greens dried out pretty well. We had to really focus on hitting to the front yardage or short of the pins.”

Vu was tied at 9-under with Choi when she came to the 12th hole and made the shot of the day.

“I hit the chip, it went in, and the rest is history,” said Vu, who was as calm in the post-tournament interview as she seems to be on the golf course this year. “I think I keep telling myself there’s nothing you haven’t done already, and I just move forward.”

Vu has now won $140,607 in 14 events on the Symetra Tour this year thanks to the three victories and eight Top 10s. In her last five tournaments, she has finished tied for fourth at the Donald Ross Classic at downstate French Lick July 8; was third at the Danielle Downey Credit Union Classic outside Rochester, New York, July 15; won the Twin Bridges Classic in Albany, New York July 23; and finished tied for second at the FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship in Battle Creek Aug. 6. Her other victory this season came at the Garden City Charity Classic in Kansas back on April 30.

In addition to Sunday’s victory, Vu also pocketed $8,000 in bonuses from the Pokagon Band of the Potawatomi, the event sponsor. That included a check for $5,000 for winning the Potawatomi Cup for accumulating the most points in the three tournaments sponsored by the Potawatomi Nation – the Island Resort Casino Championship in Harris, Michigan, last week’s FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship and the Four Winds Invitational.

Proceeds from the tournament benefit the Beacon Children’s Hospital.

FOUR WINDS INVITATIONAL RESULTS

SOUTH BEND, Ind. — Results and money earnings after Sunday’s final round of the Symetra Tour’s $200,000 Four Winds Invitational played at the par-72, 6,430-yard South Bend Country Club.

204 (-12) $30,000 — Lilia Vu, Fountain Valley, Calif., 68-69-67.

206 (-10) $19.363 — Ruixin Liu, China, 71-68-67

207 (-9) $14,102 — Robyn Choi, Australia, 69-70-68

208 (-8) $9,906 — Elin Arvidsson, Sweden, 73-68-67; Pauline Roussin-Bouchard, France, 67-69-72

209 (-7) $6,707 — Savannah Vilaubi, Downey, Calif., 70-68-71; Kum-Kang Park, South Korea, 69-69-71

210 (-6) $4,546 — Haylee Rae Harford, Leavittsburg, Ohio, 70-72-68; Katelyn Dambaugh, Charleston, S.C., 69-72-69; Min-G Kim, South Korea, 71-68-71; Sophia Schubert, Oak Ridge, Tenn., 67-71-72; Demi Runas, Torrance, Calif., 67-68-75

211 (-5) $3,644 — Fatima Fernandez Cano, Spain, 70-68-73

212 (-4) $3,172 — Yaeeun Hong, South Korea, 72-72-68; Dorsey Addicks, Big Sky, Montana, 72-70-70; Soo Jin Lee, Australia, 72-69-71; Lauren Coughlin, Charlottesville, Va., 67-71-74

213 (-3) $2,707 — Karen Chung, Livingston, N.J., 71-74-68; Taylor Totland, Tinton Falls, N.J., 74-71-68; Amy Lee, Brea, Calif., 68-71-74

214 (-2) $2,366 — Hexi Yuan, China, 75-70-69; Sophie Hausmann, Germany, 72-73-69; Julie Aime, France, 71-71-72; Kendra Dalton, Poughquag, N.Y., 67-75-72; Lucy Li, Redwood Shores, Calif., 71-68-75

215 (-1) $2,060 — Linnea Johansson, Sweden, 73-71-71; Rachel Rohanna, Marianna, Pa., 72-72-71; Allie White, Lancaster, Ohio, 71-71-73

216 (E) $1,756 — Gabby Lemieux, Caldwell, Idaho, 72-73-71; Isi Gabsa, Germany, 68-74-74; Laura Restrepo, Panama, 73-68-75; Gigi Stoll, Beaverton, Ore., 66-75-75; Tess Hackworthy, Madison, Wis., 70-70-76; Fernanda Lira, Mexico, 69-73-74

Ruixin Liu holds off No. 1 amateur Rose Zhang to win Symetra Tour title in Arizona

Ruixin Liu claimed another Symetra Tour title when she closed out amateur Rose Zhang in a playoff at the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Classic.

An amateur nearly won on the Symetra Tour on Sunday. Ruixin Liu, however, wasn’t going to let that happen.

It took two extra holes at Longbow Golf Club in Mesa, Arizona, for the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic to reach a conclusion, but when Liu made a birdie on her third trip down No. 18 for the day, she effectively wrapped up her fifth career Symetra Tour title and forced Zhang to wait a little longer for her first win on the pro circuit.

Zhang, the No. 1-ranked amateur in the world and the reigning U.S. Women’s Amateur champion, finished 11th at the ANA Inspiration last fall, an LPGA major. She has also won three American Junior Golf Association invitationals in the past six months.

Zhang, a 17-year-old who will start her college golf career at Stanford next fall, played in the next-to-last group on Sunday alongside another amateur, Arizona State super senior Olivia Mehaffey. Zhang trailed 54-hole leader Liu by three shots while Mehaffey was two shots back.

Mehaffey started her day with a birdie, but immediately gave it back with a bogey on No. 2. It was a rollercoaster from there, and a 1-over 73 left her at 11 under, six shots out of the playoff.

Zhang meanwhile, bogeyed her first hole, but then made seven birdies on the day for a 6-under 66. That was three shots better than Liu’s 69, which allowed Zhang to catch Liu at 17 under.

The two headed back to the par-5 18th, where both parred. Zhang’s tournament was derailed when she took an unplayable on the left side of the fairway as Liu made birdie.

Liu was the 2018 Symetra Tour Player of the Year, and last won on the developmental tour at the 2020 Firekeepers Casino Hotel Championship.

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Symetra Tour: Amateur Olivia Mehaffey leads by 2 after 36 holes in Arizona

Arizona State senior Olivia Mehaffey carded nine birdies on Friday to take the lead at the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic in Arizona.

Three amateurs were granted sponsor exemptions to the Symetra Tour season opener.

That decision is proving to be a smart one, as all three made the cut, two of them are sitting inside the top ten and one of them is the outright leader after 36 holes at the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic.

Arizona State senior Olivia Mehaffey has posted rounds of 69-64 and holds the solo lead by two strokes at 11 under heading to the weekend at Longbow Golf Club in Mesa. She had nine birdies and one bogey on Friday to vault to the top of the leaderboard. Her 64 is the best score of the week so far.

Mehaffey is trying to match former Sun Devil Phil Mickelson with a victory in a professional event while still in college at ASU.

Maybe it’s not too surprising. Last Sunday, she posted a final-round 62 in the Clover Cup at Longbow, helping her Sun Devils win their third college tournament in four outings in the spring season. An extra challenge this week: Longbow played at 6,184 yards for the Clover Cup and is measuring 6,439 yards for the Symetra event.

Her ASU teammate, Ashley Menne, shot a 67 on Friday, nine shots better than her first-round 76, which has moved her into a tie for 31st at 1 under.

Rose Zhang, the top-ranked amateur in the world, is also in contention after shooting 70-69 in her first two rounds, putting her in a tie for 9th at 5 under.

Longbow Golf Course
Longbow Golf Course in Mesa, Arizona. Photo by Golfweek

Laurie Coughlin, Ruixin Liu and Celine Herbin are tied for second at 10 under. Allie White is in 5th at 8 under, while Fatima Fernandez Cano is at a shot back at 7 under. Defending tournament champ Sarah White shot 73-74 and missed the cut.

SCORES: Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic

An amateur won a Symetra Tour event on the same course in 2015. Hannah O’Sullivan won the Gateway Classic at age 16, the youngest player to win on the circuit.

The Carlisle event is the first on the Symetra Tour’s 2021 schedule and features one of the bigger purses, $200,000, with $30,000 going to the winner.

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How deep is the women’s game? Sophia Popov, Sarah White showed us all last summer

Longbow Golf Club is host of the Symetra Tour season-opening Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic. White edged Sophia Popov last time out.

Sarah White packed up her 2012 Ford Escape and headed west on March 13 at 2:30 a.m., determined to get from her San Antonio suburb to Mesa, Arizona, before sunset. White’s father taught driver’s ed for 32 years, and she picked up a few pointers along the way, hence the early wake-up call.

“You’re more awake when you wake up,” she said, “than you are when you’re coming down the last four hours. I’d rather drive in the dark in the beginning.”

Dad still called every 90 minutes though.

The Symetra Tour is the ultimate road warrior life. And the 14-hour drive back to Longbow Golf Club for this week’s season-opening Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic was especially sweet for White as it took her back to the place where everything changed instantly last August when she won the Symetra Tour’s Founder’s Tribute.

The victory kickstarted a 10-day stretch of golf that shined a light on the fine line between obscurity and stardom in the women’s game. Between uncertainly and security.

A fifth-place finish at the Texarkana Children’s Charities Open on the Women’s All Pro Tour earned White $1,690 and a spot in the Symetra Tour’s field at Longbow. White – who had no status of any kind – took full advantage of the opportunity by winning in her first Symetra start, edging Casey Danielson and Sophia Popov by one stroke.

“I was just a nobody on the mini-tours,” said White.

One week later, Popov, the player White had just beaten by a stroke, won the AIG Women’s British Open at Royal Troon. Suddenly a Symetra Tour player who didn’t have any LPGA status of any kind was a major champion.

Sophia Popov
Sophia Popov, the winner of the 2020 AIG Women’s British Open, poses with the her trophy at the FireRock Country Club in Fountain Hills, Arizona. (Photo: Thomas Hawthorne/USA TODAY Network)

Like White, Popov played her way into the AIG by virtue of a top-10 finish at the Marathon Classic, which doubled as a qualifier.

“It’s pretty unheard of to have non-members of two tours win back-to-back,” noted White.

When White first arrived at Longbow last Sunday to practice, the Clover Cup, a college event she used to play in at Texas State, was finishing up on the 18th with the identical hole location she faced last August.

“I could still vividly relive that 6-foot putt and still feel the chills of everything that happened,” said White of the putt she drained to win. “I can do that any point that I need to remember why I’m here.”

Popov left Longbow disappointed to have another runner-up finish, noting that she’d been “pretty patient” waiting for that first win. She rushed out of Mesa to begin the long trek to Scotland for her first Women’s British Open appearance in nine years.

“Every shot is pretty much going where I want it to go,” she said after the round, “so all I can do is just keep doing what I’m doing. Pick a good number, pick a shot and just hit, and it’s been working really well for the last three or four months. Honestly nothing is going to change next week except for the weather.”

Only everything changed at Troon, and a 304th-ranked Popov, like White, gave countless touring pros still waiting for their big break a renewed sense of hope.

People have asked White what they need to do to get on the Symetra Tour. What does it take? She tells them that she played to her strengths and worked on her weaknesses. There’s no set formula.

Sarah White
Symetra Tour golfer Sarah White.

This week 132 players will take their first step toward trying to earn an LPGA card. White will compete alongside the No. 1 amateur in the world, Rose Zhang, and Emily Pedersen, who ended her 2020 season on the Ladies European Tour with three consecutive victories. Zhang, 17, makes her debut on the Symetra Tour this week. She won the 2020 U.S. Women’s Amateur and finished tied for 11th at last year’s ANA Inspiration.

White won’t be battling triple-digit heat this time around at Longbow. She won’t have a caddie either as older brother Brett has his own tournament this week, and her dad slipped on some ice back home in Michigan and broke his tibia and fibula.

Sarah is battling her own injury as well, a stress fracture in her left ankle and tendonitis. She only really notices the pain though after the golf is done and she’s taking her shoes off in the parking lot.

But the vibes are still good in Mesa.

“Some people have a misconception that maybe it was a little luck,” said White. “No, absolutely not. We worked to get to that opportunity.”

The notion that anyone can beat anyone any given week still hangs thick in the air.

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Wrist injury behind her, top-ranked amateur Rose Zhang ready for Symetra Tour opener

The No. 1-ranked amateur in the world is taking on the pros this week in the Symetra Tour’s season opener in Mesa, Arizona.

MESA, Ariz. — The Symetra Tour opens its 2021 season this week and a field of 132 golfers will compete in the Carlisle Arizona Women’s Golf Classic. It’s a field that will include three amateurs, including the world’s No. 1-ranked amateur Rose Zhang. She’ll be looking to continue her impressive play.

She won the U.S. Women’s Amateur in August and then a few weeks later, finished 11th at the ANA Inspiration, one of the LPGA’s major championships. It wasn’t long after that she found herself atop the Women’s World Amateur Golf Ranking. She capped off 2020 being named the AJGA’s Rolex Junior Player of the Year.

Much of this success came while she was still healing from a wrist injury.

“Over quarantine last year, I was practicing in the garage and I over-practiced on the mats,” she said on Tuesday at Longbow Golf Club in Mesa. “It didn’t really do well with my left wrist. It seemed like I got tendinitis and then it became wrist impingement.”

After she closed out 2020, Zhang said she finally got a chance to rest.

“After the U.S. Women’s Open (in December) I rested for around a month and a half,” she said, adding that she barely touched her golf clubs. “I putted a little bit but not a lot.”

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Now she’s in the field in Arizona, just a couple weeks after getting invited by Longbow General Manager Bob McNichols.

“I was actually at a friend’s house when I got the invite,” she said, admitting when the phone rang, she didn’t know who was calling. “It was a number that I didn’t really know. But I got a call from Bob and he was like ‘I’ll extend an invitation to you’ and I was like, ‘That’s great. I would definitely take that opportunity. I would be glad to’ and now I’m here.”

Making the decision last year between the ANA and the Augusta National Women’s Amateur was not so easy.

“It’s really tough because both of them being in the same week and both of them being such great events for women’s golf. It was quite a tough decision, do I want to play the major or whether I want to play the Amateur and going to Augusta National. But I think both events are great.

“Then it turns out Augusta was canceled so it worked in my favor, choosing ANA,” she noted.

Because of the COVID pandemic, the ANA was delayed to September but the 2020 ANWA was canceled. The ANWA is back this year and Zhang can’t wait to return after playing in the inaugural event.

“I was able to play in 2019 and the event was just so prestigious, the first one, being such a historical event, being a part of it was simply amazing, especially with the golf course and the Masters. There’s so much history that you can just see out there any time you’re on the course.”

As for this week, she’s not getting ahead of herself.

“I see so many amazing players,” she said. “It’s a very nice and competitive atmosphere. I have a couple friends out here that I haven’t seen since junior golf, so it’s definitely very fun and I’m excited to play with such amazing people.

“I don’t really have a goal of what place I finish. I think, for me, it’s just being able to manage myself and play the best I can, stick to my course management and try to play my best.”

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Madelene Sagstrom opens up about past sexual abuse in new LPGA Drive On feature

In the LPGA’s latest Drive On feature, many in the golf world will hear how Madelene Sagstrom overcame past sexual abuse.

Madelene Sagstrom doesn’t cry about it anymore. The sexual abuse that she suffered at the age of 7, that she buried deep within for 16 years, no longer keeps her in hiding in plain sight.

“Every time I open my mouth and say some words that I thought were hard to say a while ago,” said Sagstrom, “it becomes easier and easier, and I think that every day that I go up and I own my story, I own my history and I own who I am, I’m growing.”

On Thursday, the strong and brave Sagstrom, 28, will begin her title defense at the Gainbridge LPGA in her adopted hometown of Orlando, Florida. But on Monday, many in the golf world will hear of Sagstrom’s painful yet triumphant journey for the first time as part of the LPGA’s Drive On campaign, a series that highlights many of the tour’s inspirational stories.

Sagstrom’s abuser was a family friend who lived nearby in the Swedish countryside about an hour outside of Stockholm. She went home afterward and acted like nothing ever happened.

Fast forward to 2016, when the Symetra Tour rookie told her coach, Robert Karlsson, on the way to practice that she needed to tell him something. Later that evening in a hotel room in Greenwood, South Carolina, Sagstrom told her story to Karlsson and broke down crying.

“I had no idea how being sexually abused by a man I trusted affected me,” Sagstrom penned in a first-person story on lpga.com. “All those years, I blamed myself. I hated myself. I despised my body and hurt myself both mentally and physically. That day haunted me. I had nightmares about it and did everything I could to escape.”

Madelene Sagstrom and her mentor Robert Karlsson (courtesy LPGA)

Karlsson, an 11-time European Tour winner and former Ryder Cup player, met Sagstrom through the Swedish National team. It was Karlsson who encouraged Sagstrom to dig deep to try to understand why she was having trouble controlling her emotions on the golf course.

As she started to look inward, she began to understand that the abuse she’d suffered all those years ago had changed her. And that if she wanted to grow not only as an athlete but as a person, she’d have to confront the past.

Once she’d shared her darkest secrets with an empathetic and shocked Karlsson, Sagstrom felt an immediate release. She felt an overwhelming sense of freedom.

“I just literally grew overnight,” she said, “and I felt like I can take space.”

The woman who constantly searched for perfection and criticized herself in every way, began to put her life, and her golf, into perspective.

“When I walked off the golf course after a bad day,” she said, “my whole world wasn’t falling apart anymore.”

On the golf course, Karlsson saw her grow more comfortable within herself. She appeared lighter.

“Especially when she was under pressure,” he said.

She won three times that season on the Symetra Tour, setting a record for single-season earnings and finished in the top five in 11 of her 15 starts.

Young Madelene Sagstrom (courtesy LPGA)

At age 7, Sagstrom was a loud, lively, straight-forward kid who knew what she wanted.

Over time, after the abuse, she crawled into a hole and wouldn’t allow herself to make a mistake. She didn’t like herself as a person, but she did like herself as a golfer. If she could immerse herself in golf, she reasoned, maybe it would all be OK. In a sense, golf saved Sagstrom, but ultimately, she began to equate good golf with being a good person.

Sagstrom no longer defines herself by golf scores. And while telling her story of sexual abuse will put a label on her in the eyes of the public, she wants the focus to be on the steps she has taken to grow out of that darkness and into a place where she can spread light, “because I’m so much more than just this story.”

The process of working with the LPGA to share her journey on a massive scale began one year ago. Sagstrom admitted to shaking when she met with the media via a Zoom call on Sunday afternoon to talk about her story. She’d written about the abuse in a Facebook post four years ago, but this was the first time she’d taken questions about it.

Sagstrom knows there will be other victims who watch the video or read her account. Whether they choose to talk to someone or not, she knows that many will at least feel a little less alone.

“It’s easy to feel like you’re the only person in the world,” she said.

Roberta Bowman, the LPGA’s chief brand and communications officer, said the tour hopes Sagstrom’s story can be a resource to start conversations with LPGA/USGA Girls Golf leaders who connect with close to 100,000 girls a year across the country. Statistics show that 1 in 9 girls under the age of 18 is sexually abused at the hands of an adult.

“For years I told myself that it didn’t happen,” said Sagstrom, “but I think that me wanting to go in deeper, wanting to learn about myself and become a better version of myself, I just understood this is a part I have to deal with. I can’t unlock my potential and my freedom if I don’t deal with this.”

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Bailey Tardy missed out on her LPGA card by $343. It left her sour, but she’s ready to fight.

Bailey Tardy missed out on her LPGA card by just $343. It left her sour, but she’s ready to fight.

Last year Bailey Tardy missed out on an LPGA card by $343.

When the Symetra Tour season was over, Tardy laid in bed at night replaying all the shots she could’ve saved. Holes she would’ve played differently. Putts she’d like to have back.

When she’d go out to the course at home in Georgia, her mind would wander to a tournament, making quality practice nonexistent. She used words like “sour” and “bitter” to describe the mood and likened her predicament to being one number off on the lottery.

“I kind of just removed myself from golf,” she said of the resulting six-week break.

Because the COVID-19 pandemic shortened the Symetra Tour season to 10 events, only five cards were awarded last season. Tardy didn’t have great status on the developmental tour, but because so many international players didn’t come back for 2020, she got into all 10 events. And she made the most of it, finishing sixth on the money list with three top-five finishes.

Typically, 10 cards are awarded each season. And usually if a player finished 11th on the money list, she’d punch a ticket directly to Q-Series with a chance to earn LPGA status. Except Q-School was canceled in 2020. The former Georgia standout finished last season exactly where she started – 151st on the priority list in Category I.

“I still don’t have great status,” said Tardy, who isn’t entirely sure how many events she’ll get in this season.

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On Wednesday, the Symetra Tour announced a 2021 schedule of 20 events with $3.8 million in total prize money. As frustrating as the $343 gap turned out to be, Tardy knows that something good came out of those 10 events: confidence.

“I didn’t even play my best golf last year,” she said, “and still was able to contend most of the weeks.”

Tardy can’t put a price-tag on that feeling of belonging. It wasn’t all that long ago that she saw her name on the leaderboard at the 2017 U.S. Women’s Open and nearly broke down crying, she felt so overwhelmed.

“Now,” she said, “I’m getting comfortable seeing it up there.”

Tardy recently headed down to Florida to get ready for the mid-March opener in Mesa, Arizona. She hired a putting instructor over the offseason, fully aware that the number of three-putts she’d had over the course of a three-round tournament, as many as eight, was keeping the former Curtis Cup player out of the winner’s circle.

Mentally, Tardy says, she has taken big strides since college.

“In college,” said Tardy, “I didn’t have a mental game.”

Last offseason she hired Bob Rotella and said the way she looks at her golf game is night and day.

“People would always be telling me, ‘You have one of the greatest golf swings,’ ” said Tardy. “I don’t know why I would never believe that.”

At a U.S. Women’s Open, she’d see people watching her on the range and worry about them nitpicking her swing. It was the same on the putting green.

“No one is even looking at you,” she’d tell herself.

Bailey Tardy and her mother Kim (photo courtesy Alison Palma/Symetra Tour)

A more confident Tardy hit the road last year with her mother Kim, whose real job is real estate agent, as her caddie.

Mom is there for comic relief, said Bailey, and they make a great team.

Two years ago when Florida Tech won the NCAA Division II title, a volunteer assistant coach convinced one his players – who was 6 down through 12 holes – to go into a tree pose to work on deep breathing in the middle of the fairway. Kim Tardy read that story and as a yoga enthusiast, now jokingly tells Tardy to go into a tree pose when she gets nervous.

(By the way, that Division II player rallied to win the match after that yoga pose.)

Mom will be back on the bag for the first part of the 2021 season, at least until work brings her back to Georgia.

Tardy met Sophia Popov for the first time at the LPGA stop in Portland last year, after the Symetra Tour player from Germany broke through with that inspiring victory at the AIG Women’s British Open.

From Symetra Tour player to major champion in the span of one week gave hope to countless grinders who are still waiting for their big break.

“She has fought to get to where she is,” said Tardy. “You may have one setback, but it doesn’t mean anything. I kind of related to that.”

This spring, the fight continues.

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Cheyenne Woods, fresh off a mini-tour win, is on the bag for Yankees outfielder Aaron Hicks at Diamo

Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols interviews Cheyenne Woods at the Diamond Resorts TOC, where she is caddying this week for her boyfriend and Yankees outfielder, Aaron Hicks.

Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols interviews Cheyenne Woods at the Diamond Resorts TOC, where she is caddying this week for her boyfriend and Yankees outfielder, Aaron Hicks.