Allisen Corpuz shot 9-under 279 to win her maiden major at Pebble Beach Golf Links in California
Women’s majors move to historic courses
Watching the women play Pebble Beach for the first time was to watch them walk in the footsteps of history. Aside from Augusta National and St. Andrews, there is arguably no golf course in the world that is more iconic, or more recognisable, than Pebble Beach.
“I think when casual viewers of golf tune in and see that the U.S. Women’s Open is at Pebble Beach it’s like, “Oh, this is something I need to pay attention to”; Because even the casual sports or golf fan knows Pebble Beach,” two-time U.S. Open champion Karrie Webb said before the tournament.
Nasa Hataoka makes birdie at No. 10 and is firmly in the #USWomensOpen mix. pic.twitter.com/WJmDwZzIVH
— U.S. Women’s Open (USGA) (@uswomensopen) July 8, 2023
Pebble Beach has been the site of some of golf’s greatest performances, and greatest shots. Think of Jack Nicklaus’s one-iron that hit the flag on the 17th hole in 1972, or Tom Watson’s chip-in for birdie on the same hole in 1982 that denied Nicklaus a record fifth U.S. Open title. Tiger Woods’s 15 shot victory in 2000 was the most dominant performance in the history of major championships and was the start of his record run of four major championship wins in a row.
The women now have a Pebble Beach winner of their own in Hawaiian Allisen Corpuz, thereby uniting the history of the women’s game to that of the men, and making the game
stronger as a whole.
That’s why it was also fitting that 33-year-old Michelle Wie West, the former phenom, and 52-year-old Annika Sorenstam, one of the greatest ever women golfers, chose to say goodbye to their competitive careers this year at Pebble Beach. Neither made the cut but they made memories for themselves, their families and the spectators. Sorenstam was clear how much playing here meant not just to her, but to women’s golf as a whole.
“To see how far women’s golf has come the last few years by playing courses like this, and I’m hoping there are young girls around the world that are watching this championship that are dreaming about one day playing on the LPGA or in a USGA championship,” Sorenstam said. “We’ve played some great courses in the past, but this is a course where people fly around the world to come and play.”
The USGA has fittingly announced that the U.S. Women’s Open will return to Pebble in 2035, 2040 and 2048 and go to other famous courses like Riviera in LA in 2026 and Oakmont in 2028.
Corpuz etches her name in History
Allisen Corpuz made history by winning the first U.S. Women’s Open ever played at historic Pebble. The 25-year-old Corpuz finished at 9-under 279 to win by three over Korea’s Jiyai Shin and Britisher Charley Hull. She was the only player in the field to shoot under par in all four rounds, shooting 69-70-71-69.
Enjoy the walk, @allisen_sc! #USWomensOpen pic.twitter.com/olTHEyjJ63
— U.S. Women’s Open (USGA) (@uswomensopen) July 10, 2023
Corpuz, who is from Honolulu, Hawaii, earned her first LPGA Tour victory with some nerveless play on the final day back nine. Tied with Japan’s Nasa Hataoka with nine holes to play, she birdied the 10th, 14th and 15th to build a four-shot lead. A bogey on the par 3, 17th was just a blip on her way to claiming the biggest title in women’s golf which came with the whopping $2 million winner’s cheque .
“My mind is racing,” Corpuz said. “It was something I had dreamed of, but at the same time kind of just never really expected it to happen.”
Corpuz continues a trend of first time major winners
Corpuz is the 20th different player to win a women’s major over going back to the 2019 U.S. Women’s Open, a span of 21 majors. The only player to win more than one major since then is Minjee Lee, who has won two. Corpuz is also the fourth first-time major winner in the last five U.S. Opens. Again, the only exception is Lee, who won the Evian Championship in 2021 for her first major.
Corpuz turned pro in 2021 and went through qualifying to earn her LPGA card for 2022. Last season she made Corpuz made 17 cuts in 21 events and posted three top-10 finishes, including a runner-up finish at the ISPS Handa World Invitational, but did not win.
But while she was a relative unknown before this week, she has played well in the majors this year. She finished tied for fourth in the Chevron Championship after holding the 54-hole lead and finished tied for 15 th in the PGA Championship, suggesting that it was only a matter of time before she broke through.
The majors offer life changing prize money but regular tour events lag behind
Two years ago, the U.S. Women’s Open’s total purse was $5.5 million. This year it was $11 million. That created a situation where even those players who missed the cut still got paid $8000.
A win for the whole family ❤️#USWomensOpen pic.twitter.com/ls8wLBVtiQ
— U.S. Women’s Open (USGA) (@uswomensopen) July 10, 2023
Likewise, the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship increased it’s purse by $1 million this year, taking the total to $10 million. This was also the sixth straight year the PGA upped its purse.
Meanwhile, the AIG Women’s British Open prize fund has increased 125 percent since 2019. According to Golf Digest, There’s also an expectation that the AIG Women’s Open, and the Evian Championship, will boost their prize money totals even more in 2023.
All of this is obviously great for women’s golf but as an article in Golfweek from November 2022 pointed out, regular LPGA Tour events have not kept pace.
“The average purse on the LPGA 10 years ago – not counting the majors or CME – was $1.57 million,” the author Beth Ann Nichols wrote. “This year it’s $1.87 million. That’s an increase of 19 percent over the course of 10 years, below the rate of inflation in that timeframe.”
In other words, the majors are a good start but there is still work to be done.
Credits:-
Photo – USGA