Green Posse

March is Women’s History Month, so it’s fitting to look at the beginnings of the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA), the longest-running women’s psorts association in the world. The organization was founded in 1950 by 13 women, including Babe Zaharias (pictured above), Patty Berg, and Louise Suggs. It was a refinement of the WPGA (Women’s Professional Golf Association), founded in 1944. The first season, the LPGA hosted 13 events with total prize money of $50,000.
Today, the LPGA sponsors 33 events with prize money of more than $58 million. How far we’ve come! The LPGA also funds the LPGA …read more

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If the first two rounds of the HSBC Open in Singapore are any indication, this is going to be an exciting LPGA season (as if we didn’t already suspect that). Last year’s top-ranked player, Lorena Ochoa, debuted at this event and marched right to the top of the leader board. She finished Thursday’s round with a one stroke lead at six under and returned to shoot a seven under on Friday.
Trailing Ochoa by seven strokes are last week’s Fields Open champion, Paula Creamer; Sweden’s Annika Sorenstam (never one …read more

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Paula Creamer won the LPGA’s Fields Open Saturday, pulling ahead of Jeong Jang on the back nine by birdeying four of the last five holes. Her -16 for the tournament earned her $195,000 and a stay for two at Tucson’s exclusive Canyon Ranch spa.
Jang finished second with -13 and Annika Sorenstam finished at -12 for fourth place, making her the leading money winner so far this short season. Michelle Wie, who began the season with this tournament, ran out of steam …read more

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As most of the world’s golf fans are watching the men compete in the WGC Accenture Match Play (after Thursday, Tiger’s in; Phil’s out), the women of the LPGA are in Hawaii competing in the Fields Open. It’s the season debut for Michelle Wie, who looked fit to play, finishing five strokes behind the leader, Jeong Jang after the first round.
Jang (pictured above) has been on the tour since 2000 and has two career wins. Last year she lost to Natalie …read more

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The LPGA Tour will become the first golf organization to institute a drug policy. Penalties for violators are severe, including a one-year suspension for the first offense to a lifetime ban for the third offense.
With the policy, there will be no difference in the punishment for positive tests of performance-enhancing drugs or recreational drugs.
LPGA Tour general counsel Jill Pilgrim, who is administering the new program, said marijuana constitutes a downer and cocaine works like an upper.
“Technically, they are enhancing your performance,” Pilgrim said.
It was not announced at which tournament the random drug testing would start. However, the first opportunity …read more

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Lorena Ochoa overcame a double bogey on the 17th with an amazing shot out of the rough and over the water to 3 feet for birdie Sunday. With the victory, Ochoa won the ADT Championship and claimed the $1 million prize – the largest in women’s golf.
When Ochoa double-bogey’d on 17 and Natalie Gulbis birdied, Ochoa’s lead was cut to one stroke, but she held on for the victory.
The win was her eighth victory of the year, joining Annika Sorenstam and Nancy Lopez as the only players to accomplish that in the last 20 years.
Read more about Ochoa’s ADT …read more

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Annika Sorenstam was eliminated in a playoff at the ADT Championship on Friday. The former #1 player ended the year without a victory for the first time since 1994.
Sorenstam was one of three players trying to earn the last two spots in the quest of the tournament’s $1 million prize. But after she hooked a shot into a bunker, she was soon eliminated.
Mi Hyun Kim shot two-under-par on Friday to finish atop the leader board of the 16 golfers who qualified for the weekend. She finished one shot ahead of Morgan Pressel as they head into Saturday’s action. The …read more

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The LPGA Tour season ends this week with the four-day ADT Championship. Thirty-two golfers have qualified for the event. They will now compete for a $1.55 million purse with $1 million of it going to the winner. The $1 million prize is a record-tying amount for first-place on the LPGA Tour.
The ADT Championship is held at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach. The 2006 ADT Champion was Julieta Granada, who beat Lorena Ochoa by two strokes.
The 32 players will compete in three days (November 15-17, 2007) of “playoffs” and then a …read more

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For the second year in a row, Lorena Ochoa received the National Sports Award in her native country of Mexico for her work in promoting the sport of golf, as well as for her charity work through the Lorena Ochoa Foundation.
This is the third time that Ocho received the award, which is presented annually by the president of Mexico. In 2001, she was the first golfer to receive the honor.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon Hinojosa honored Ochoa after the final round of the 2007 Corona Championship, soon after she was named the number one player in the world on the …read more

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