Ochoa poised to sweep top titles in women’s golf
Perhaps you thought the possibility of a single-season Grand Slam ended a few days ago when Tiger Woods finished second at the Masters, the first men’s major championship of the season. You thought wrong.
An unprecedented single-season sweep of the major championships is still alive in the world of professional golf. The hottest player in the game still chases that carrot, with one slight difference.
The hottest player in golf is not Woods, who had knee surgery immediately following the Masters and is expected to miss at least four weeks. The hottest player in golf — actually, in all sports — is Lorena Ochoa.
“That’s more the fans’ and the media point of view,” Ochoa said during a news conference after her victory at the Ginn Open on Sunday. “But to be able to put my name next to (Woods) is always an honor, and I’m happy with that.”
Ochoa isn’t just pulling alongside Woods, she’s pulling away. Ochoa has won 19 times in little more than two years, including 10 wins in her past 15 tournaments. She has four wins in succession, the first time that has happened on the LPGA Tour in 45 years. She has won five of her six tournaments in 2008 by margins of five, seven, 11, 11 and 3 strokes.
She also has won the past two LPGA
majors, including the first of the 2008 calendar. Two more majors in succession and the native of Guadalajara Jalisco, Mexico, would have her own version of the “Tiger Slam” of four majors Woods captured between 2001-2002.
One more major after that and Ochoa would do what has never been done: a single-season sweep of the major championships. Improbable, yes, but at this point where Ochoa is concerned, anything seems possible. And when you consider the 26-year old’s track record, it fits.
“I don’t need to have any extra pressure,” Ochoa said. “I know I can do it. I believe in myself. It will be something amazing. I’m just, it’s too early to start talking about it … So I’m just going to do it one at a time, and I think I can do it.”
Supremely fit, thoroughly driven, Ochoa takes everything a step at a time … then gobbles things up in bunches. She began playing golf at the age of 5, won her first national tournament at the age of 7. Then she went on to win 44 national tournaments in Mexico, once winning five consecutive Junior World Golf Championships events.
When she accepted a golf scholarship to Arizona, her English was weak. So, when she wasn’t playing, she accelerated the learning process by watching movies and reading magazines — learning one phrase at a time. She now handles the English language just fine.
At Arizona, Ochoa was NCAA player of the year in 2001 and 2002. During her sophomore season in 2002, she set an NCAA record with seven victories in her first seven events. Are you recognizing a pattern here? She knows something about setting goals and meeting them.
Ochoa is 5 feet 6 and generously listed at 130 pounds, yet she is a formidable package of power and precision. She is ranked first in LPGA statistics for driving distance (277.5) and greens in regulation (81.0 percent) and is tied for eighth in putts per GIR (1.74).
Her scoring average of 67.87 is almost 2 strokes better than the next closest competitor, Annika Sorenstam (69.77), and nearly a stroke lower than the season average scoring record of 68.67.
But the Ochoa sensation is more than statistical. The LPGA has been starved for personality. For her 70 wins, 10 majors and Hall of Fame credentials, the stoical Sorenstam — whom Ochoa overtook in April 2007 as the top player in the world — is not the most vibrant personality.
Ochoa is bright, humble, accommodating and energetic. When she won the Kraft Nabisco Championship, she made the traditional leap into Poppie’s Pond by dragging her caddie and most of her family in with her. When she arrives at tournament sites, she routinely visits the maintenance crews, often manned by transplanted Mexicans.
She begins every press session with a friendly “Hello.” She is popular with galleries, reporters and her fellow players. “Everything that she’s done this year has been phenomenal,” said Brittany Lincicome, another young LPGA star. “Just being her as a person, she would give you the shirt off of her back if you needed it, just being so nice and be able to play so well and not being cocky about it.
“(It’s) how she presents herself. She’s definitely a role model to every kid, every adult, everybody out there that likes golf.”
Ochoa is grand for the women’s game right now, but she has a chance to be even more. If she wins a third major in succession at the McDonald’s LPGA Championship in June, the headlines and the press contingent will swell.
If she makes it four in a row at the U.S. Women’s Open at Interlachen Country Club in late June, if she takes a Grand Slam opportunity to England’s Sunningdale Golf Club in late July, those elements multiply again. And if she accomplishes the unprecedented one-season Slam before the incomparable Woods, the impact will be significant for women’s golf.
“I guess right now I’m a little bit ahead (of Woods) because I won the last two,” Ochoa said. “So I like that idea; I’m ready for that.”
For Lorena Ochoa, Grand Slam dreams and caviar wishes are still alive.
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