2003 Wachovia: Other Notes from Kutztown

Sunny Lee transcendent
Sunny Lee has not had what you would call a great career so far in the LPGA. In 2002 she missed every cut, making not even a single cent. But things have started to look up in 2003. She made her first LPGA cut this year, although she finished dead last in that event. She missed her next two cuts, but by two shots or less both times.

Still, nothing prepared us for what she did this week. Her four under 68 in round 1 of the Wachovia Classic not only was the best score of her LPGA career, it also left her in a tie for second after round 1. Never before had Sunny been in the top twenty after a round of golf, let alone as high as second.

Sunny Lee had her best ever finish by far at this year's
Wachovia Betsy King Classic
Reuters/Tim Shaffer

Sunny came pretty close to her first LPGA top 20
Reuters/Tim Shaffer

But with Sunny, you never know if the next round will be good or a disaster. So imagine her happiness when she managed a respectable even par 72 in round 2 to not only make the cut, but to remain in 8th place. Another 72 on Saturday, and she was still, amazingly, in 13th place. This is a player who had never finished higher than 70th before. She even got shown (twice!) on the coverage. On Thursday, they showed her chipping in for eagle on the 18th hole. Not a bad shot to show of hers! In fact, she would get as low as 5 under that day before a final hole bogey knocked her back to 68.

On Sunday she had more difficulties, but a three bogey one birdie performance insured that she would still get the best finish of her career. And indeed she did, a 29th place that was worth nearly $9,000. This one check quadrupled her career earnings on the LPGA. Her hard work seems to be paying off, and here's hoping that Sunny will soon demonstrate some of the great golf that made her a top player in Korea for many years.

Christina in control
Despite a so so tournament, Christina Kim got all sorts of attention at the Wachovia. On one day she was miked for play, and the commentators had fun with her tendency to talk constantly as she plays. She also was hooked up with a radio commentator, who acted as her caddie during the pro-am on Wednesday. He reported that Christina had played in every LPGA event this season (wow!), and was starting to hit the wall energy wise. She apparently has not been home in San Jose since early in the season. Here's hoping she doesn't push it too hard. She's having a very good rookie season, but she's only 19 and has many years to go.

Then, Christina was invited to sit in the control room and help the directors during the broadcast of the tournament on the Golf Channel. She was briefly miked during this, and talked about how challenging it was to keep track of everything. Her job was to let the directors know what was going on at various holes, so they could decide whether to show the action at those holes. On one hole we overheard her say that Se Ri Pak had just hit a great tee shot, but unfortunately, they did not switch to show it. What was interesting about this segment was that, after this little interview, they basically forgot about her the rest of the telecast. I kept wondering if they ever let her go home? Next time we need closure on this kind of thing, people!

Christina at the US Open