One Last Time With Feeling

While only time will tell if the Vision 2010 business plan established by commissioner Carolyn Bivens succeeds, the birthing pains of the new reality were felt strongly at the last Corning Classic, at 31 years the longest-running LPGA event held on the same course with the same sponsor. While the atmosphere in this tiny south-central New York town was more celebratory than funereal, there was also a bit of melancholy, akin to bidding farewell to an old friend with the hope the separation is more of a parting than a passing. There was also a spirit in this remarkably resilient community that hinted the LPGA could end up missing Corning more than Corning misses the LPGA.

Most everyone agrees the demise of the Corning Classic marks the end of an era for the LPGA. The new era, however, is uncharted. The tour almost certainly will have fewer tournaments—at least in the short term—and a greater percentage of events outside the United States. Perhaps fields will also be smaller—the Asia model is about 70 players with no cut—and purses may be reduced as the global economy resets itself.

The one inarguable strength the LPGA possesses, however, is a broad-based talent pool. All that's missing is its Tiger Woods, a supremely dominant player to strut upon the world stage and draw fans from outside the base. (Oh, Michelle Wie where have you gone?) And that's exactly why communities like Corning are so important to the LPGA. Here, everyone is treated like Tiger Woods.

"It's really sad," said Natalie Gulbis after playing her final round at Corning CC. "It was sad last night when we were talking about it, and it was sad after every single hole you played. People would say such nice things. I played here seven years, and I am going to miss coming here and the support we got from the people."

What's also missing is a robust global economy to support the tour. "With the way the world is right now, there definitely is concern this won't be the last tournament to go away this year," Gulbis said. "I know there are [more than a dozen] tournaments up for renewal. So we are keeping our fingers crossed. Events like this are really the backbone of the tour. There is so much history here—31 years—and it's sad to lose it."

Over the last year, the LPGA has lost the Fields Open, Ginn Open, Ginn Tribute, SemGroup Championship, SBS Open and ADT Championship. This year's Bell Micro LPGA Classic has been pushed back to 2010. The LPGA Tour Championship will be played in November at the Houstonian G&CC, apparently without Stanford Financial as the title sponsor. The Phoenix stop does not have a sponsor for next year, nor does the LPGA Championship, which will lose McDonald's after this year's tournament.

InBev, the new owners of Anheuser-Busch, are lukewarm at best about continuing the Michelob Ultra Open at Kingsmill, and the LPGA event at Kapalua will likely go away unless a title sponsor is found, especially since Seoul Broadcasting System, former sponsor of the SBS Open, recently signed a 10-year deal with the PGA Tour to sponsor what was the Mercedes-Benz Championship at Kapalua.

J Golf, the Korean cable outlet that outbid SBS for the Korean TV rights to the LPGA beginning next year, will sponsor a tournament in Southern California. Already, 11 LPGA events are played outside the United States —five in Asia, three in Mexico, two in Europe and one in Canada.

"We are fully aware of the realities that the current economic downturn presents all our tournaments," said Bivens, "which is why we have been flexible working with both individual tournaments with specific challenges and the tournaments as a whole."

Bivens cited as examples allowing flexibility to Bell Micro and the decision to delay for a year the scoreboard costs being transferred from the tour to the tournaments. She said it was too early to speculate how many events would be on next year's schedule.

Since Penny Pulz won the first Corning Classic in 1979—10 years before this year's winner Yani Tseng was born (see page 35)—the tournament has epitomized the tour's most loyal fans. In the eyes of the locals, LPGA players are superstars, and they were made to feel that way.

Corning, a city built up by the Corning Inc. glassworks, has fewer than 11,000 people. Some years, as many as 50,000 people turned out over four days, which means the daily attendance at times exceeded the population of Corning. The community embraced the tournament in a storybook way.

This year, 56 of the 147 players stayed with families, reflecting friendships developed over the years. A leader board sat on Centerway Square off Market Street in front of Corning's clock tower. In years past the Wegmans supermarket constructed an 18-hole miniature golf course in its store aisles and held contests for customers, each hole having the theme of the product aisle it occupied. Stores on Market Street, the main commercial district, decorated their windows in golf motifs and players would judge the best.

At Aniello's Pizzeria or The Glory Hole Pub & Eatery, a bar named for the furnace used to heat glass, players mixed easily with the locals. This year, the Glory Hole greeted customers with a sign reading: "Welcome LPGA Golfers, Caddies and Fans. We will Miss You!" The Thursday night farewell party featured a pitcher of beer and a bucket of wings for $15.

"They'll be back, they have to," said David O'Brian, a customer at the Glory Hole. "We need to keep it here," said Linda Jellif. "This is what makes Corning Corning." Then she hit on the slight many in the community felt. "Hey, we're just a small town, and the LPGA is going away because we're so small," says Jellif. "But I guess if we weren't a small town all of us would go away. This is the way we like it."