January 2012: Golf Digest Woman: Golf Digest

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Results for January 2012 Back to Golf Digest Woman Index

Sandra Gal is crowned GolfDigest.com's Hottest Golfer

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Drum roll, please: After two months of online voting and 16 head-to-head matches (peruse the full men's and women's brackets here), we finally have an overall winner in the GolfDigest.com Hottest Golfer competition. Twenty-six-year-old LPGA Tour player Sandra Gal from Germany, who triumphed in the women's bracket last week, didn't just defeat 23-year-old men's champ Rickie Fowler for the ultimate crown -- she annihilated him. Gal got a whopping 99.6 percent of the more than 80,000 votes cast. This may be an indication of the gender of our voters, but it also speaks volumes about the popularity of this former ballet dancer from Dÿsseldorf.

Slideshow: Sandra Gal on and off the course

A four-year veteran of the LPGA Tour, Gal just completed her most successful season, which included a win at the Kia Classic in March and a second-place finish at the CME Titleholders in November. Golf Digest Woman recently caught up with Gal to talk about the year ahead. (For more of Sandra, check out the March issue of Golf Digest.)

GDW: Congrats on a great season. What are you going to do to top it in 2012?

SG: Thanks. I feel like I'm on the right track, but you really have to look at your weaknesses and your strengths, work hard during the off-season and then continue working throughout the year. One of the things I want to improve a lot is my fitness.

GDW: Your fitness? You're one of the fittest players out there!

SG: [Laughs.] Yeah, well, I'm not complaining about my body or anything, but I definitely want to get fitter, as in cardio. I sometimes get tired a little too quickly -- especially in the middle of the year, when we have all the majors. I kind of had a little slump there [last year]. So I just want to keep it up throughout the year, and lay a solid base in the off-season.

GDW: You have a lot of hobbies, such as painting and sailing. Do you believe that you can only be a great golfer if you're a well-rounded person?

SG: Definitely. I feel like I play better golf if I'm a happy person. It's kind of different than the men, isn't it? Like, they play good golf and they're happy but the women have to be happy before they can play good golf. I think you just need to have a balance in everything you do. I've only learned this recently but it works great for me: I play hard a few tournaments, then I take a week off and do a vacation and take my mind off everything, and then I go back and I'm really motivated to start working hard again. In the past I would kind of burn myself out, and at the end of the year I just couldn't see golf anymore. Now, I'm happy to have a vacation but I'm really excited for 2012. I'm not fed up with golf, because I did other things during the season and kind of kept a balance. I gave myself mind breaks. Another thing I did last year is, you know, we travel to so many great places and most of the time it's just kind of hotel, golf course, hotel, golf course, but I really tried to take time and see things at the places we were at. It's not always easy with all the stuff we have to do off the course, but it's been a lot of fun.

GDW: You've become one of the glamour girls of the LPGA Tour. You're known for your style and your beauty and your physique -- especially your legs. How did that come about? A happy accident or something you work hard on?

SG: My rookie year, I signed with a model agency called Wilhelmina. And I was with them until the end of '09. Through them, we did a few photo shoots, and those pictures kind of went around the world. So I think that's where this whole image started. I still do some of that. I'm going to do a photo shoot this week, kind of a fashion shoot for a big German magazine. It comes up once in a while, but it's not something I really work on or try to do. It is fun, I do enjoy it, but I don't do it very often. I always see myself as an athlete and someone who wants to perform at her best - [modeling] is not something I see as that important. I do like fashion, but I'm not hugely into it. I kind of just go with my intuition.

GDW: What do you do to stay in shape?

SG: I still like dancing. I'm not a hugely flexible person, so doing ballet really helped me to kind of get some sort of flexibility and have good posture. And it really helped me with my coordination and feel for movement. Nowadays, the last couple of years, I've been working with Dave Herman and he does a lot of work with bands -- they're called SuperFlex bands. That's really helped with my flexibility and strength and speed. You can just travel with them and work with them on the road, even if you don't have a gym. But that's just part of my workout. I do a lot of cardio, and I do a lot of core and weights.

GDW: You're a singer, too, is that right?

SG: Oh, well... it's a funny story. This British record company contacted me a couple of years ago and I think they just saw an article in a magazine and said, "Maybe she can sing too." [Laughs.] So they just asked me if I wanted to come by and record this one song. I've never really been singing. I mean, I have a good ear for music -- I hit the notes. But I don't have a big voice, you know, I've never trained. We just did this one song called "Dice." It's on my website, just for fun. I thought, if I have a chance to do it, why not? You probably don't get that many chances to record a song.

--Stina Sternberg

Did the voters get it right? Is Gal the worthy champ? Voice your opinion on our partner site, GolfWRX.com.

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LPGA announces 2012 schedule with four more events

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

There has never been any doubt that LPGA commissioner Mike Whan can work the front end of a deal. He is a born salesman with a quick wit and an agile mind fueled by a conga line of empty diet soda cans. He also believes passionately in his product. Whan thinks women's golf is under-valued by the marketplace with a lot of growth potential, and he is correct about that.

But Whan, who took over as commissioner in 2010 after the disastrous Carolyn Bivens regime mercifully came to end, has had trouble at the back end of deals. And that has probably been more a result of the worst economy in 80 years than either his selling skills or the quality of his product. Whan took over with the tour in a 20-foot hole and he was handed a 10-foot ladder.

Finally, however, all that hard work -- those meetings and social functions where endless words were exchanged -- have started to pay off. The 27-tournament schedule released Tuesday by the LPGA could very well be the most crucial corner turned in a seemingly endless series of twists and turns during the 62-year history of the tour. The edge of that hole is now within reach.

Photo by Sam Greenwood/Getty Images

Last year, Whan said the LPGA needed to have 30 events to function both financially and to get the media coverage it needs to grow. At the time, that seemed like a remote goal. After a season in which only 23 events were played -- the fewest since 1972 -- Whan's target date of 2013 for getting back to 30 seemed to be beyond reach. No more.

"At the end of last year, I felt like I was hitting a lot of good iron shots, but the putts weren't going in," Whan said about negotiating efforts that appeared at the time to go well and then failed to produce a title sponsor. "Now the putts are dropping," Whan said. Asked if 30 were now doable next year, he said: "I sure hope it's doable. If we don't get there, I'll feel like I'm under performing."

New to the 2012 schedule are the season-opening ISPS Handa Australian Women's Open Feb. 9-12, the LPGA LOTTE Championship at a yet-to-be-named course in Hawaii April 18-21, the Manulife Financial LPGA Classic in Waterloo, Ontario, June 21-24 and a return to the Kingsmill Resort in Virginia with the Kingsmill Championship Sept. 6-9. The Jamie Farr Toledo Classic in Ohio also returns Aug. 9-12 after a one-year hiatus.

There are way more positives than negatives in the new schedule. From the start in Australian until the conclusion at the CME Group Titleholders in Naples, Fla., Nov. 15-18, there are never more than two weeks without a tournament. Last year, there were two three-week droughts. Also, there are 15 domestic tournaments this year (plus two in Canada), up from 13 in 2011, which is good news for young North Americans trying to work their way on tour.

There is no question that the schedule does leave plenty of work for Whan to do. From when the first major of the year -- the Kraft Nabisco Champions -- ends April 3 until the Jamie Farr Toledo Class begins Aug. 9, there are nine off weeks. That's missing a lot of marketing opportunities during the heart of the golf season.

The limited field and unofficial money HSBC Brazil Cup fills one of those off-weeks May 5-6 and the LPGA does use its off weeks wisely. The tour skips the weeks the men play the Masters, the U.S. Open, the British Open and the Ryder Cup. In addition to the 15 events the tour has in the United States, the two in Canada and one in Australia, there are six in Asia, two in Europe and one in Mexico.

"It feels like we got all the basics right," Whan said about the success of the scheduling effort, which also managed to bring back nine of the 10 existing tournaments whose contracts were expiring, losing only the State Farm Classic after a 35-year-run. "It's about servicing your clients. We knew if we did that right, success would follow -- and it did."

Certainly, players are a big part of the formula for success. LPGA pro-ams consistently rank among the top customer experiences in the world of sports marketing and entertainment. Potential sponsors who visited LPGA events were also impressed with how well LPGA players interacted with corporate partners, Whan said.

Whan also got two other boosts form players last year. Yani Tseng emerged at the age of 22 as a superstar, winning seven LPGA events, including two majors, as well as five times overseas. And Lexi Thompson, still only 16, became the youngest winner on both the LPGA (Navistar LPGA Classic) and the Ladies European Tour (Dubai Ladies Masters), creating a lot of headlines for attention-starved women's golf.

Two events on the 2012 schedule -- the Mobile Bay LPGA Classic and the Kingsmill Championship -- don't have true title sponsors and will cobble together secondary sponsors to help with the costs while they search to someone to put their name on the event and pick up more of the tab. "If we weren't treating our customers right, people wouldn't say: 'Put us on the schedule and we'll figure it out,'" Whan said.

The rumored team event that would bring Asia and Australia into something resembling the Solheim Cup does not appear on this schedule and won't happen this year, but is still being worked on. It will happen, and with a unique format. It is not a question of if, but when -- and where. And that means another playing date down the road, albeit for a limited field.

Meanwhile, it would not be surprising if Whan were able to add one more full-field event to this year's schedule. "I still know there is at least one out there we could put on the table, but we haven't," Whan said about another potential title sponsor. "And I want to get them all." At the rate he is going, there is no reason to doubt he will get that one -- and many more.

-- Ron Sirak
Follow @ronsirak

Below is the full 2012 LPGA schedule:

1. ISPS HANDA AUSTRALIAN WOMEN'S OPEN FEB. 9-12

2. HONDA THAILAND FEB. 16-19

3. HSBC CHAMPIONS FEB. 23-26

OFF MARCH 1-4

OFF MARCH 8-11

4. RR DONNELLY FOUNDERS CUP MARCH 15-18

5. KIA CLASSIC MARCH 22-25

6. KRAFT NABISCO CHAMPIONSHIP MARCH 29-APRIL 1

OFF APRIL 5-8

OFF APRIL 12-15

7. LPGA LOTTE CHAMPIONSHIP APRIL 18-21

8. MOBILE BAY LPGA CLASSIC APRIL 26-29

OFF (HSBC LPGA BRAZIL CUP - UNOFFICIAL) MAY 3-6

OFF MAY 10-13

9. SYBASE MATCH PLAY CHAMPIONSHIP MAY 17-20

OFF MAY 24-27

10. SHOPRITE LPGA CLASSIC JUNE 1-3

11. WEGMANS LPGA CHAMPIONSHIP JUNE 7-10

OFF JUNE 14-17

12. MANULIFE FINANCIAL LPGA CLASSIC JUNE 21-24

13. WALMART NW ARKANSAS JUNE 28-JULY 1

14. U.S. WOMEN'S OPEN JULY 5-8

OFF JULY 12-15

OFF JULY 19-22

15. EVIAN MASTERS JULY 26-29

OFF AUG. 2-5

16. JAMIE FARR TOLEDO CLASSIC AUG. 9-12

17. SAFEWAY CLASSIC AUG. 17-19

18. CN CANADIAN WOMEN'S OPEN AUG. 23-26

OFF AUG. 30-SEPT. 2

19. KINGSMILL CHAMPIONSHIP SEPT. 6-9

20. RICOH WOMEN'S BRITISH OPEN SEPT. 13-16

21. NAVISTAR LPGA CLASSIC SEPT. 20-23

OFF SEPT. 27-30

OFF OCT. 4-7

22. SIME DARBY LPGA MALAYSIA OCT. 11-14

23. LPGA HANABANK CHAMPIONSHIP OCT. 18-21

24. SUNRISE LPGA TAIWAN CHAMPIONSHIP OCT. 25-28

25. MIZUNO CLASSIC NOV. 2-4

26. LORENA OCHOA INVITATIONAL NOV. 8-11

27. CME TITLEHOLDERS NOV. 15-18

Is the LPGA heading in the right direction? How excited are you for 2012? Sound off on our partner site, GolfWRX.com.

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Sophie Gustafson receives the GWAA's Ben Hogan Award

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

When LPGA star Sophie Gustafson decided to ask for a sit-down interview with the Golf Channel during the Solheim Cup last September, she never imagined the impact it would have on her life. In her 13 years on the LPGA Tour, she'd always flown somewhat under the radar despite five wins and a stellar Solheim Cup record. Many golf fans didn't even know the stoic Swede suffers from a severe stuttering problem, because she'd stayed away from giving interviews and victory speeches. But as her eighth Cup rolled around, she resolved to let the cat out of the bag.

"It's always a bummer during the Solheim Cup because everybody else is doing interviews and press conferences, but no one even bothers asking me if I want to do them anymore," Gustafson told Golf Digest Woman afterward. "That's why I wanted to try something for this edition. I feel like I have a lot to say and can actually be pretty funny, but it's hard to get it out since I usually keep my mouth shut in public."

Gustafson (left, with Suzann Pettersen) put up a perfect 4-0 record for the victorious 2011 European Solheim Cup team. (Photo by Getty Images)

The reaction to Gustafson's candid interview, during which she sat alone in a room with a camera for over an hour, was overwhelming. She was applauded in the media and on Twitter as a great inspiration to others, and the Golf Channel has since re-aired the piece several times. The once anonymous player became one of the most talked-about names in golf in 2011. "I received notes from parents after my TV interview telling me that their kids stutter and now they finally have a sports 'hero' that they can relate to, to look up to," Gustafson tells Golf Digest Woman. "It's very special to get that kind of feedback from people."

On Wednesday, the Golf Writers Association of America announced Gustafson as the 2012 recipient of its prestigious Ben Hogan Award for remaining active in golf despite a physical handicap or serious illness. From the GWAA release: "Gustafson has been on eight Solheim Cups and won five LPGA events in her 13-year career, but hasn't gotten the attention that such a record would merit because of her stuttering problem. Last fall, she opened up and went 'outside my comfort zone' to do a pre-Solheim television interview with incredible grace and dignity. She often lets her thoughtful -- and fun -- side and her sense of humor show through on her blog and in her tweets. She edged Bryce Molder for the Award. Heath Slocum finished third."

Gustafson is grateful for the recognition. "I'm incredibly honored and humbled to receive this award," she tells us. "I've never seen my stutter as much of an obstacle in playing golf, but if people can use my handicap as inspiration in realizing their dreams, I couldn't be happier."

Gustafson, along with William D. Richardson Award winner Major Dan Rooney and ASAP/Jim Murray Award winner Brad Faxon, will be honored at the annual GWAA Awards dinner April 4 in Augusta, Ga.

--Stina Sternberg

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