2006 Ginn Clubs & Resorts Open

Every once in a while, a new sponsor arrives on the scene who wants to make a big splash on the LPGA. A few years ago, it was Evian, who turned their little tournament in France into one of the biggest money events in women's golf. Then in 2003, Michelob Ultra switched from sponsoring a men's event to sponsoring the LPGA. They were able to provide a huge purse and still save money from what the PGA had been charging them. They did everything first class, treating the women like rock stars and pampering them with the kind of immaculate course and efficiently run event that the men take for granted, but the women only rarely experience. Last year, HSBC decided to extend its support of a World Match Play tournament to the distaff side and created the HSBC Women's World Match Play to join their men's event. The purse again was eye opening: even the third place golfer received more money than some tournaments gave to the first place golfer; the winner made a cool half million bucks. Not surprisingly, this event instantly became a 'must attend' for all the top golfers on tour. As more of these events arrive, it becomes harder to make a big splash. The women are the big beneficiaries, as the competition has driven their purses up more and more.

In 2006, the latest entrant into the big money new event sweepstakes bowed: the Ginn Clubs and Resorts Open. Ginn is a company that runs a series of high end living communities that cater to people who like the all-inclusive lifestyle. A number of these communities include golf courses. The company decided a good way to publicize one of these communities would be to hold an LPGA event there; and since the tour did not have a regular full field tour stop in Florida (and in fact had not had one since the 2001 season, when the Office Depot and Your Life Vitamins tournaments folded), it was a perfect confluence of a niche that needed filling on the tour and a sponsor's desire to fill it. And so, the Ginn Clubs Open was born. To make sure the event would do well, Ginn ponied up a tidy $2.5 million purse, which made it instantly the second most lucrative event on tour (behind only the US Women's Open). Once again, a new sponsor created an event designed to get everyone's attention (by the way, to show that this competition is still alive and well, Evian quickly boosted their own purse to $2.6 million - shortly after the Ginn Clubs Open was announced - to once again become the second richest event in the league).

As you can imagine, the huge purse attracted almost every top player in the league; 49 of the top 50 on the money list, to be precise (the only holdout was Young-A Yang, ranked 38th at the start of the week). No expense was spared; Ginn invited the Pointer Sisters and country stars Brooks and Dunn to perform concerts during the week, and even PGA star Lee Janzen played in the pro-am. Janzen is sponsored by Ginn, and probably thought he was going to have a few laughs by playing in the pro-am, but came away impressed by his LPGA pro, whom he claimed hit the ball even straighter than he did. That pro was Mi Hyun Kim, and Kimmie would go on to turn a few more heads before the week was over.

The big story as the week began, however, was not the preponderance of LPGA talent in attendance, or former men's US Open winners in the pro-am, or even concerts. The stories catching attention at the start of the week were the two sponsor's exemptions for the event. The first was a lady named Andia Winslow. She is an amateur golfer who played for Yale, but that is not the reason she was special. Winslow was also the first African American to play on the tour in 5 years. Winslow also had been the first African American woman to play golf in the Ivy League. But an even bigger story was the other sponsor's exemption: 13 year old Dakoda Dowd. It's true that Dowd's age alone would be enough to turn heads, and there's no doubt that, with a plethora of junior golf wins, she is one of the most talented young golfers in the country. But that was not the reason she got the exemption. It had always been the dream of her mother, Kelly Jo Dowd, to see her daughter play on the LPGA. But Ms. Dowd had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and it was doubtful she would live long enough to see that dream come true. Bobby Ginn, CEO of Ginn Clubs, heard the story and extended Dakoda an offer to play in his event. Few would have guessed the media onslaught that would result from that decision.

In the end, both ladies did their best, but neither came close to making the cut. But as far as feel good stories go, it's hard to top them.

Meanwhile, the rest of the tournament went on as normal. Being this was the first time most of these women had played this course, the scores were understandably a bit high. But the course also had large, undulating greens and fast stimp meter ratings, testing the short games of the best women golfers in the world. The cliché of an event offering 'Major-like' conditions might be a bit extreme in this case, but it was not far off the truth.

The leader after round one was American Cristie Kerr, who had been playing solid golf all year without a win to show for it. She shot a 7 under par 65. Not surprisingly, Lorena Ochoa, who seemed to contend every single week on tour thanks to her tendency to get out to strong starts, was tied for second after a 67. Tied with Lorena was Laura Diaz, for whom her 67 was the best round she had shot all year. The top Korean on the board was the aforementioned Mi Hyun Kim. Peanut had already managed two top five finishes in 2006, one of which she had had a serious chance to win (the MasterCard Classic). Although 2005 had been the worst season of her career, it seemed as though 2006 was going to be a whole lot better. Kimmie shot a 2 under par 70 and sat in a tie for 6th. The other player at 2 under after day one was rookie Sun Young Yoo, a rather surprising player to have managed that given she had only made her first cut of the year in her previous event. The golfers at 1 under included another rookie, Jee Young Lee, and Sung Ah Yim, who had shocked Annika Sorenstam to win the tour's previous event, the Florida's Natural Championship (read all about it elsewhere in this issue!). In the end, not everyone was able to finish due to the slowness of play, so round one actually completed early Friday morning.

In round two, to no one's surprise, Lorena Ochoa continued her fine play, making a gaggle of birdies and zooming out to a solid lead. The only player in the field who was keeping pace with her was Mi Hyun Kim, but Ochoa maintained a two shot lead on Kimmie much of the day. How was Mi Hyun able to do so well, when she was one of the shortest drivers in the field? The answer was her short game. She had been demonstrating her phenomenal short game all year. At her previous good finish at the Takefuji Classic, she seemed unable to hit greens, yet still made few bogies thanks to her uncanny talent around the greens. She was hitting more greens this week than she had at Takefuji, and combining that with her great putting, she was one of the few in the field to advance far into red numbers (by the end of the day, only 13 players would be below par).

Ochoa reached 10 under par while Mi Hyun got to 8 under. But then Ochoa pushed a drive on the 14th hole into the trees. She was forced to take an unplayable due to her difficult lie. She then tried to get over the trees but clipped a branch and fell straight down. By the time her adventure was over, she had made triple bogey on the hole and dropped to 7 under par, where she would eventually finish the day. For the first time in the tournament, Mi Hyun Kim sat at the top of the leaderboard. Kimmie would hang onto her spot at 8 under and go into the weekend as the leader. Coming in at 6 under par was the Japanese rookie sensation Ai Miyazato. So the final group would contain Kimmie, Ochoa and Miyazato. One thing was for sure: with the gigantic throng of reporters who followed the Japanese star's every move, Mi Hyun would not have to worry about empty galleries on Saturday.

Meanwhile, Seon Hwa Lee shot a 5 under par 67 to move into contention as well. Like Ochoa, it seemed a week rarely went by where the Korean super rookie was not in the hunt. The other Korean or Korean-American players under par after two rounds were Christina Kim, who finished day two at 3 under, and Young Kim, who was at 2 under.

Then there was Se Ri Pak. Coming back from an event where she had to drop out due to injury, Se Ri had played an unusually strong round on the first day. She hit 11 fairways and 14 greens and finished the day at even par, very solid for this course. But on day two, she struggled a bit more, and began to fall down the leaderboard towards the cut line. Fortunately, she righted the ship just in time, and a last hole birdie gave her a 2 over par 74 for the day and 2 over par total for the event. Since the cut ended up being 4 over, she made it with room to spare. Her current position, tied for 34th, even gave her a shot at a top ten if she could rally on the weekend. Talk about an occurrence that was long overdue!