The 37th edition of the RICOH Women's British Open starts this Thursday Aug. 1st at the venerated ‘Home of Golf’, The Old Course at St. Andrews in Fife, Scotland.
The tournament started in 1976, but it wasn’t until 1994 that it became an LPGA event, and until 2001 that became an LPGA Major tournament. The first winner of the event as a Major was Hall of Fame South Korean legend Se Ri Pak.
Pak inspired a generation of South Korean golfers when she won 1998 U.S. Women’s Open. This year, one of those golfers, Inbee Park, will be chasing history as she goes for her fourth consecutive professional Major title at St. Andrews—all in the same year.
It’s only fitting that it comes at the ‘Home of Golf’ which builds upon the lofty expectations for this year’s tournament, and whether Park wins it or not, it will be a historic one.
Asian players have dominated women's Major golf in recent seasons. Players from the continent of Asia have won the last 10 Major titles. Stacy Lewis of the USA was the last non-Asian winner. She took the 2011 Kraft Nabisco Championship.
There will be plenty of talented players from the US and Europe looking to end that run this week. In fact, no less than 41 players from the States will tee it up this week. Stacy Lewis and Paula Creamer will lead the American challenge while Suzann Pettersen and Catriona Matthew will be the top ranked European players in the field.
The Old Course at St. Andrews
The Old Course at St Andrews is the world's most famous and historic golf course. It forges out from the town of St Andrews towards the Eden Estuary, before turning and heading back towards the famous buildings of the "Auld Grey Toon." The layout should, once again, provide a dramatic and appropriate setting for the world's best female golfers to do battle.
The tournament returns to St Andrews for the first time since 2007. Then World’s No. 1 Lorena Ochoa was the victor on that occasion. The players are extremely excited about teeing it up in golf’s Cathedral and they should be. On the men’s side it has hosted The Open 28 times with the likes of Bobby Jones, Sam Snead, Jack Nicklaus, Seve Ballesteros and Tiger Woods among the greats to have won it.
The key hole should be the 17th; one of the most iconic in the world that is also known as ‘ The Road Hole.’ The players must drive over the sheds to the side of the Old Course Hotel, finding the narrow fairway that slants to the right. The long approach must be a precise one, avoiding the perilous Road Hole bunker. Coming in with a long club, it will be tough to get the ball to stop on the narrow green before it tumbles down the bank and onto the road behind the putting surface.
Inbee Park
Park is at the Home of Golf, looking to win a fourth consecutive Major championship. Having already won this year's Kraft Nabisco Championship, LPGA Championship and U.S. Women's Open, if she can take the title this weekend she will become the first player, male or female, to win four professional Major championships in the same calendar year.
Her motivation this weekend is clearly on winning and making history. Her grip on the World’s No. 1 ranking and first place in the money list are solid. She has 4.93 more average points more than her nearest challenger, previous No. 1 Stacy Lewis, and more than doubles Lewis’ earnings on the money list.
Park is the best putter in golf, male or female, at this moment. She leads the universe with a 1.703 average putts per green in regulation. On the PGA Tour, Phil Mickelson is the leader with 1.709.
In the past three editions, she has finished T-9th, T-7th and solo second last year; an improvement every year that goes by. Her natural progression would be to win this year, which means she would have won the first four Majors, thus achieving the Grand Slam.
Top Players to Challenge Inbee Park
Jiyai Shin is the defending champion. Last year’s win marked the second time she won the tournament, with her previous win coming in 2008 at Sunningdale. Those two wins are her two career Major championship wins.
She captured it in dominating fashion, shooting rounds of 71-73 in a 36-hole finale Sunday to take a record-breaking, nine-shot victory over Park who finished in solo second. Shin finished at nine-under 279 and was the only player in the field this week who managed to finish under par at the difficult Royal Liverpool Golf Club.
Catriona Matthew is the home favorite. The 43-year-old Scot was a winner of this tournament back in 2009 by three strokes over Karrie Webb and has Top 10s the past two years. She has been on good form this year. She lost out to Park in a playoff for this year's LPGA Championship.
Hall of Famer Karrie Webb from Australia, honed her game this past weekend with a victory in the ISPS HANDA Ladies European Masters at the Buckinghamshire. She is looking to pick up her second British Women's Open title. She won in 2002 at Turnberry and has been playing a rejuvenated golf lately, seeing her rank rise to No. 6 in the Rolex Rankings.
Paula Creamer to date has only one Major to her name—the 2010 US Women's Open. But she is a solid performer in the biggest events. She has 14 career Top 10 Major finishes and she also has a great record in the British Women's Open. She was third last year and was T-3rd in 2009 which followed Top 10 finishes the previous two years.
So Yeon Ryu, the 23-year-old South Korean who won Rookie of the Year Honors in 2012, is on a meteoric rise through the ranks. She has a major to her credit, the 2011 U.S. Women's Open and this year she has finished third to Park in the U.S. Women's Open, second to Park in the Kraft Nabisco and lost in a playoff to Park in Arkansas. She finished T-5th last year in her first RICOH Women’s British Open appearance and is due for a breakout win and there is no better timing than reversing her finishes to park at golf’s biggest stage.
Stacy Lewis hasn’t been performing to the level that saw her climb to No. 1, especially in the majors. But the former No. 1 is slowly getting back on track after a mini-slump and has scored a couple of Top 10 finishes in her last two tournaments. She has finished T-8th last year and T-11th in 2011 in this tournament.
Suzann Pettersen, the World’s No. 3 player, has seven Top 10 finishes this year. In her last outing, she missed the cut at the U.S. Women’s Open, but finished T-3rd in the first two majors, but missed the cut in the last major. She won the 2007 LPGA Championship but hasn’t performed particularly well in the RICOH Women’s British Open. Her best finish, and only Top 20 was a T-14th in 2010.
Na Yeon Choi is the World’s No. 4 player and while she has six Top 10 finishes this year, she hasn’t been playing at the level that took her to capture the U.S. Women’s Open last year. But she has been a solid and consistent performer in her five starts at the RICOH Women’s British Open with three consecutive Top 10 finishes from 2009-11 before finishing T-13th last year.
Yani Tseng was the dominating force in Women’s golf from 2010 through the middle of last year. She held the No. 1 ranking for a whopping 109 consecutive weeks from 2011 to 2013 and won four majors, including back-to-back RICOH Women’s British Opens in 2010 and 2011. She still only 24-years-old and believes she can be No. 1 again. If she can summon that ability of hers once again, she could take a big step back to the top with a win here this weekend.
Coverage
Aug 1 - ESPN2 9:00 AM-12:00 PM ET
Aug 2 - ESPN2 9:00 AM-12:00 PM ET
Aug 3 - ESPN2 10:00 AM-1:00 PM ET
Aug 4 - ESPN2 10:00 AM-1:00 PM ET