Each has contributed to the Koreans' growing influence on the LPGA, according to the Samsung Economic Research Institute.
"First and foremost, fathers played a pivotal role by encouraging their daughters to start golf at an early age," SERI researcher Min-hoon Lee told the Korea Times. "The so-called golf daddies also made all-out efforts to support their daughters full-time.
"The players themselves also have virtues of an unparalleled work ethic as well as self-restraint, which seem to have something to do with the country's Confucian tradition."
The Koreans tend to focus on golf to the exclusion of everything else, according to Lee, who said, "They are workhorses who pay attention only to golf."
Koreans have won six times on the LPGA this year, including three of the last four.
-- John Strege
