This is as good as it gets

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/08/2010 (5820 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Pro-am partners and club members stand aside, the best women golfers on the planet are about to take their best shot at St. Charles Country Club for the 2010 CN Canadian Women’s Open.

All of the top LPGA Tour stars are in Winnipeg for the 72-hole national championship that gets underway early this morning.

World No. 1 Ai Miyazato of Japan, who has won five times already this season, will try to maintain that ranking in what has turned into a heated battle for the top spot in women’s golf.

No. 2-ranked Cristie Kerr of the U.S., the LPGA Championship winner earlier this summer, and No. 3 Suzann Pettersen of Norway, the Open’s defending champion, also tee it up today.

South Korea’s Jiyai Shin, No. 4, and double-major winner this year Yani Tseng of Taiwan, world No. 5, are also vying for the winner’s cheque of US$337,500 in the fourth-highest purse of the year, $2.25 million.

Fourteen Canadians are in the field, including the top-ranked LPGA Tour member Alena Sharp of Hamilton, plus four players from Canada’s national amateur teams.

Miyazato is unmatched in victories this LPGA Tour season and is trying to conquer a fifth country this week.

"I had such a good off-season this year and really got good feelings since the beginning of the season," Miyazato said Wednesday. "I’m not really hitting far with my driver but then I really worked hard with my short game."

Miyazato has won the Honda in Thailand, HSBC Women’s Champions in Singapore, the Tres Marias Championship in Mexico, the ShopRite LPGA Classic and last week’s Safeway Classic in the U.S.

She said her putting caught fire again last week in Oregon, when she bested Kerr and Na Yeon Choi by two shots.

"If it’s high expectations, it’s really tough to keep control of myself," Miyazato said of last week. "So I just stayed calm and tried to be myself and it happened, so I was really happy."

Kerr, who came to last week’s final hole with a shot at victory, said that 2010 has been an exciting time in women’s golf.

"As you can see, the rankings have been changing every week and there are four or five people that can challenge with a win every week," Kerr said Wednesday. "And it’s pretty amazing what Ai’s done with five victories this year."

Kerr, who’s a double winner this week, vowed to go full-out for this week’s trophy.

"I’m going to leave nothing in the tank this year and however many more years of my career that I will have," she said.

Coming out of a heat wave, last week’s course near Portland was in excellent condition, but running very firm and fast.

It sounds like it’s not going to be any softer in Winnipeg, where the 6,572-yard St. Charles not only has some bounce, but wiry rough.

"I would say it’s pretty much the same, maybe a little bit more (firm) here," U.S. Women’s Open champ Paula Creamer said. "You get a lot of roll. There’s a lot of three-woods off of tees just because there’s certain bunkers that you have to avoid and there are little neck areas, little narrow fairways.

"Length really isn’t going to play a huge part on some of these holes; it’s more about placement. I hit the rough a couple of times, just this far into the rough and I could only hit 9-iron out."

Miyazato concurred.

"Last week was pretty firm as well," she said. "I don’t know, maybe this week is a little bit more firm than last week probably, yeah."

She also said that a flat course that doesn’t have flat greens, plus possible wind, will be factors.

"It’s in really good shape. I think it’s a beautiful golf course," she said. "It’s kind of flat, but the greens (have) many undulations. It seems like it’s a windy place over here, so it depends on the wind. Maybe it’s going to play really tough. If there’s not wind, I think some players can shoot really low scores."

She predicted the winning score could be in the neighbourhood of 12- or 13-under.

Forty-six of the top 50 players from the tour’s money list, and 92 of the top 100 are in Winnipeg this week. The highest-ranked player from the money list who didn’t make the trip is No. 27 Jeong Jang of South Korea.

 tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca

 

Blasberg fondly remembered

 ERICA BLASBERG, the professional golfer who played the LPGA Tour but was found dead in her Las Vegas apartment in May, was remembered fondly Wednesday by U.S. Open champ and friend Paula Creamer.

"It’s still hard to believe she’s gone," Creamer told the Free Press at the CN Canadian Women’s Open, a day after the Clark County (Nev.) coroner ruled that Blasberg’s death was a suicide.

Creamer shared a story about Blasberg, with whom she played plenty of junior golf and tournaments.

"We had a lot of fun times out on the golf course, played against each other pretty much every week," Creamer said. "There are a couple of good stories. I have to tell you the Lexus Cup one. I burned down a table in my hotel room with my hair straightener and I knew that if I called Erica — she and I had a lot in common in that we always wanted to look nice and be dressed up very girly — she’d have hers plugged in for me and I was in there every day. I’d just be right in there to straighten my hair with her.

"It’s funny how we’re such competitors on the course, so fierce and always want to be the best, but when we slip away from the golf course, we’re just normal, 20-year-old girls just trying to do the things we love."