2005 Awards

Each year, Seoul Sisters Magazine reviews the best and worst moments of the previous golf season, and gives awards to the most deserving Korean women golfers. Who will win this year's Most Improved Player? Rookie of the Year? Player of the Year? Never before have there been so many Korean golfers playing at such a high level. So join me now as we review the highlights and lowlights of the recently completed season...

Best Start to the Season:
Bo Bae Song
This is traditionally the first award I give, but in 2005, it's a hard one to bestow. By and large, the Korean players did not get off to a particularly strong start in 2005. In fact, it was not until May that we started to see Koreans really make noise on tour, although after that they made quite a bit of noise indeed.

So this year, I'm going to pick Bo Bae Song as the fastest starter, even though she does not play on the LPGA tour. Song was coming off a rookie season on the KLPGA tour that saw her win Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year, and she dominated the money list as well. But in 2005, she managed to enlarge her legend even more right off the bat. Playing in Singapore at the Samsung Ladies Masters, an event on the Ladies European Tour, she shocked everyone by winning, beating such well known stars as Laura Davies and Soo-Yun Kang in the process. This win earned her playing privileges on the LET; she became the first Korean to gain the right to play on that tour. Less than a week later, she teamed with Jeong Jang to finish second at the Women's World Cup of Golf. While most lady golfers were still in Winter Training mode, Bo Bae was getting it done all over the world!

Honorable Mention: Hee-Won Han, who notched two early top fives to stake an early claim to the Korean Player of the Year award.

Bo Bae Song was all smiles after capturing the
Singapore Ladies Masters last January

Se Ri had this kind of distressed look
on her face much of the year

Biggest Disappearing Act
Se Ri Pak
Let's get this one out of the way as soon as possible. Everyone who follows the Korean women golfers knows that 2005 was an annus horribilis for the great Se Ri. Se Ri had never finished below 12th on the money list; even in 2004, in which she struggled for much of the year, she still finished 11th and claimed 5 top tens. But in 2005, she was not able to do anything right. From the first event she played, she struggled, and struggled like she had never done before. Not only was she not contending for wins, she was having a hard time getting top twenties. Even when she would do well for two or three rounds, she would end up in 34th place by the time the final putt dropped. She missed several cuts, something quite rare in her life, and for the first time missed a cut at an LPGA Major (the LPGA Championship). By August, she was not only frustrated and burned out, but she also had a finger injury to contend with that made it impossible to play even if she wanted to.

If there's a silver lining, it's that, since she was not able to play for several months, perhaps Se Ri finally got some much needed time away from the game. This will hopefully lead to not only a much improved 2006, but also a happier, healthier Se Ri. Here's hoping!

(Dis) Honorable Mention: Shi Hyun Ahn. Grace Park had a bigger slump, but that was largely due to injury. Shi Hyun was a non-factor in 2005 after being brilliant in her rookie year.

Kimchi Power! Most impressive overall Korean performance of the year:
Safeway Classic
The Korean golfers benefited from the slumps of Se Ri Pak and Grace Park in one way: with the superstars out of the picture, some of the promising second tier players really stepped up their games in 2005. Out of the 8 tournaments won by Koreans in 2005, six were won by first timers. It became fairly common to see two or even three Koreans in the top five in 2005, and there were also three one-two finishes last year. But without a doubt the most impressive Korean Power demonstration came at the Safeway Classic in August, and this reporter was fortunate enough to witness it in person. Simply put, it was the most impressive single weekend in perhaps the history of Korean golf. Koreans were everywhere on the leaderboard all week; the final two days, the final group consisted entirely of Koreans, and they were not the same ones each day, either. In the end, Soo-Yun Kang claimed her first career victory with ease. Jeong Jang, coming off her own first win just weeks earlier, placed second, while Gloria Park finished third. Rookie Joo Mi Kim finished 4th, and rounding out the top five, rookie Sung Ah Yim grabbed a tie for fifth with Beth Daniel. The top five places on the leaderboard, plus Hee-Won Han and Aree Song in 10th for a total of seven in the top ten. A phenomenal group performance.

Honorable Mentions: Wow, so many! CJ 9 Bridges, 8 Koreans in the top ten (and 5 of the top 6) was a pretty amazing accomplishment in its own right. Only Carin Koch in third place prevented this one from being another sweep. They also nabbed 4 of the top five at the Jamie Farr Classic (but not the win!) and 6 of the top 8 and 11 of the top 20 at the Sybase Classic (but again, no winner!!).

Kangsy led a Korean sweep of the top five spots
at the Safeway Classic in August, the first time
the Korean ladies had ever managed such a feat

Best Korean Confrontation of the Year:
Jimin Kang vs. Meena Lee, Corning Classic.
There were several great battles between Korean stars through the season, but what seemed to happen more often than not was that one Korean player would stake out a lead and hang tough, and the other Koreans in the field would not quite be able to get over the hump and catch her. The one exception to that in 2005 was the Corning Classic. Coming into this event, Annika Sorenstam was almost unbeatable, but even though she had a shot at winning, it ended up being two Korean golfers who had never previously won on tour who duked it out for the trophy.

Jimin Kang had looked strong early, but it was Meena Lee, a rookie with few made cuts to date, who suddenly found herself on top of the leaderboard with a few holes to go. Jimin was on a downward trajectory when she reached the par 3 15th hole, but one swing later, she had an improbable hole in one and had climbed back into a share of the lead. Kang followed that up with another birdie on 16 to take the lead, but Lee refused to buckle, and despite having the harder putt on 17, it was Meena who made the clutch birdie to retake a share of the lead. It all came down to the final hole, where Meena's nerve finally gave out and she made a double bogey after a terrible drive, allowing Jimin to make par and take the trophy. But the title was still in doubt right until that time.

Honorable Mention: The Office Depot, where Soo-Yun Kang nearly caught Hee-Won Han but couldn't make birdies on the final few holes to seal the deal.

Jimin Kang was all smiles after her clutch win at the
Corning Classic. Meena Lee had to
settle for second place

Cinderella of the Year:
Birdie Kim
Without a doubt, the most improbable and unexpected victory of the year was that of Birdie Kim at the US Women's Open. In all of history leading up to that point, only two Koreans had ever won a Major: Se Ri Pak and Grace Park, the two undisputed superstars among the Korean players. Even great players like Hee-Won Han and Mi Hyun Kim had never hoisted a Major trophy in their careers to that date. Birdie Kim, a journeyman player who had only one top ten in her career leading into the US Open, was probably the last Korean anyone would have thought would contend. Yet with a few holes to go on Sunday, it was Birdie who sat atop the leaderboard. Still, this was a course where even a superstar like Lorena Ochoa could make a quadruple bogey; nothing was guaranteed. Birdie would go down in history, however, thanks to an amazing shot that, you can bet, we will be talking about a little later in these pages!!

Honorable Mention:
Jee Young Lee, CJ 9 Bridges Classic
Any other year, a little know Korean rookie winning an LPGA event to secure an LPGA tour card would have been an untoppable Cinderella story .