There may be one overriding theme to the 60th U.S. Women’s Open – Annika Sorenstam’s quest to win the third leg of the Grand Slam – but that doesn’t mean there aren’t hundreds of other compelling things to watch for the next four days at Cherry Hills Country Club.
There may be 156 things – the number of players in the field, each of whom has, if not a good chance to win, at least the opportunity to cherish the memory of a lifetime.
“The U.S. Open is extremely special,” LPGA veteran Laura Diaz said. “There’s the emotion that people feel; the love that we as players have for the tournament.”
If Sorenstam doesn’t win, who does? There’s 15-year-old amateur Michelle Wie and 18-year-old Paula Creamer, both of whom would become the youngest winner in tournament history. Then again, observers would be foolish to count out the likes of Juli Inkster, Laura Davies or defending champion Meg Mallon.
But that won’t be decided until Sunday afternoon.
THE PLAYERS TO WATCH
Annika
Everyone lavishes praise on the Super Swede, but it’s her statistics that speak volumes.
Sorenstam’s scoring average this year is 68.60, best on tour. She stands a net 91-under par for the season and enters this championship the biggest favorite since Tiger Woods was lapping the PGA Tour field in 2000.
The veterans
1. Laura Davies – The big bopper will take some chances with her driver. If she’s accurate, the reward will be a bundle of birdies.
2. Juli Inkster – The two-time U.S. Women’s Open champion loves USGA setups; the harder the better.
3. Grace Park – When she’s healthy, she is as talented as anyone. And after playing nine holes Wednesday, she insists her back problems have subsided.
The longshots
1. Jimin Kang – The South Korean, who played college golf at Arizona State, got her first career win at the Corning Classic this year helped by a hole-in-one, then shot a 27 on the back nine on the last day of the ShopRite Classic.
2. Natalie Gulbis – The heartthrob is looking for her first victory. But she’s no Anna Kournikova. She has game, having notched five top-10s this year.
3. Rosie Jones – At 45, she has 13 LPGA victories but no major championships. She’s a short hitter, but that could work to her benefit in terms of keeping it in the fairway in her last Open.
What to watch
1. Head to the No. 1 tee and see if Laura Davies, Michelle Wie or Brittany Lincicome can duplicate Arnold Palmer’s 1960 feat of driving the green on the 346-yard par 4.
2. Go early to No. 18 on Sunday and reserve a seat in the grandstand so you can watch history being made if Annika Sorenstam wins the third leg of a Grand Slam.
THE STRATEGY
Cherry Hills’ bluegrass rough, allowed to grow 3 1/2 inches and thickened by spring showers, figures to take the driver out of the hands of some players.
Natalie Gulbis, for example, plans to keep the driver in the bag on at least half the holes. Annika Sorenstam has indicated she might use a driver on only two holes.
Laura Davies, on the other hand, intends to pull out the big stick high grass or no high grass.
“I always play aggressively,” Davies said. “I always like to go down fighting than to have not tried. I’d rather finish 50th trying to win it than finish second trying to finish second.
“You can’t worry about the rough. If you start worrying, ‘Oh, I can’t hit it in the rough,’ once you’ve got to do something, it’s harder to do.”
After booming tee shots during a practice round, Davies reached the green with a 4-iron second shot on the 531-yard, par-5 17th and the No. 18 green, a 459-yard par 4, with a 4-iron.
“Those holes are good for me,” Davies said. “They take two good drives and two good irons. But that’s what the better players are going to do. That’s where the winner is going to come from.”
THE FIRST ROUND
Lorena Ochoa, who won the LPGA Tour event in Rochester, N.Y., on Sunday with six birdies on the back side, reflects the attitude of most players regarding a major championship: Don’t treat it differently or you’ll play differently – usually worse.
“I try to play it as it’s just one more tournament,” Ochoa said. “I don’t want to put more pressure on myself by thinking I have to do something I don’t normally do.
“The one thing different is you have to be more patient.”
THE COURSE
It’s easy to say beforehand, but competitors were saying after practice rounds this week that Cherry Hills, the longest course in U.S. Women’s Open history at 6,749 yards, is playing fair.
Tough, but fair.
“It’s going to be more difficult as each day goes by,” Aree Song said. “The greens are not as fast as they look right now. But they will get more difficult. You really have to put the ball under the hole so you have a good chance at birdies.”
“It’s not going to be a course setup that rewards taking chances,” Lorena Ochoa said. “The fairways are narrow. The rough is really high. If you try to reach the green from the rough, you’re probably going to get in more trouble. You just have to punch out, get it back in the fairway and try to make par from there.”
THE FAVORITE
It was said in Jack Nicklaus’ heyday that the rest of the field always kept one eye on the scoreboard to see where the Golden Bear stood. The same can be said about Annika Sorenstam.
“When you’ve got a player like Annika, you don’t have to look at anyone else,” Laura Davies said. “I’m just trying to finish one stroke ahead of Annika. If I do that, I believe I’ll win the tournament.
“I think if I finish one shot ahead of Michelle (Wie), I won’t necessarily win the tournament.”
The difference
No matter what players say, the U.S. Women’s Open is different. They just don’t want to think about that.
“You know there is more pressure and there’s more hype and there’s more money and the girls are playing better,” Natalie Gulbis said. “But you really have to work on thinking like it’s any other event.”
Said 18-year-old Paula Creamer: “I try to take care of my own business. I try to just play my game and I am going to be playing against the greatest players in the world every day, and I think that’s fantastic. That only helps me and motivates me to be the No. 1 player in the world.”
The rough
It’s really, really rough. The thick stuff became the talk of the practice range Wednesday.
“The rough has fangs,” Aree Song said. “You’ve got to keep it in play, it’s like a one-shot penalty automatically. I don’t think you can really go for the green once you’re in there. The smart players just sand wedge it out.
“You have to really be smart. You have to stick to your game plan if you’re in it.”
Rosie Jones has played in 23 previous U.S. Women’s Opens. She can’t recall rough this gnarly.
“The rough is as tough as I’ve ever seen it,” Jones said. “It’s 4 inches (actually 3 1/2) and it’s straight up and down. When you go to pick the ball out of there you can see it’s just a concave area made by the ball, all the way to the root.”
USGA official Tom Meeks said the rough will be cut daily to keep it at 3 to 3 1/2 inches.
The elevation
Aree Song, a native of Thailand who played high school golf in Florida, realized on the first approach shot in her first practice round this week that it’s a different game at altitude. Song flew the No. 1 green with a 168-yard 7-iron. She normally hits her 7-iron no more than 150 yards.
“I thought, ‘Whoa. Where did that come from?’ ” Song said.
Song will be trying to figure out how to adjust for the thin air like everyone else.
“I don’t think it flies as far in the mornings here,” Song said. “But in the afternoon it definitely flies.”
Well, that’s an interesting theory.
Laura Davies said she doesn’t want to hear the actual yardages from her caddie this week.
She would rather have him automatically deduct 10 percent before recommending a club.
“There’s no point in hearing about the 10 percent,” she said. “If you’re standing there with a 9-iron and it’s 170 yards, I want him to tell me it’s 153. I know I can hit a 7-iron 153. If he tells me 170, I don’t know. I might try to force it.
“I want to hear ‘153’ and away we go.”
