Sirak Says: Going For The LPGA Gold

By Ron Sirak
Photos By Getty Images June 3, 2008

HAVRE DE GRACE, Md. -- Several years back, Karrie Webb pondered the LPGA schedule and said, "If you get hot at the right time you can win three majors and all the money." That "right time" she referred to began last week at the $2.6 million Ginn Tribute and continues this week at the McDonald's LPGA Championship -- and Lorena Ochoa stands poised to cash in.

Ochoa goes into the second major of the year, beginning Thursday at Bulle Rock GC near Baltimore, with a chance not only to accomplish the goals to which Webb referred, but also with a chance to make LPGA history. With six wins and a major already in the bank, Mickey Wright's record of 13 wins in a season is in play for Ochoa, as is the chance for a first-ever calendar year Grand Slam in professional golf.

And since the nine-tournament stretch that begins this week includes three major championships and seven purses of at least $2 million, including the $3.1 million U.S. Women's Open and the $3 million Evian Masters, Ochoa could make a run at breaking the record $4.4 million single-season earnings mark she set last year.

The 26-year-old Mexican star, who withdrew from last week's Ginn Tribute to visit her ailing uncle in Mexico (who died last Thursday), has already won $1.8 million this year. Bulle Rock, with wide fairways, is a long-hitters course, which fits perfectly with Ochoa's game.

Ochoa got her first major title in the Ricoh Women's British Open at St. Andrews last August. She followed that by capturing the Kraft Nabisco Champion in April. A victory at the McDonald's would move her within one major of a feat accomplished only by Tiger Woods and Mickey Wright: holding all four professional major trophies at the same time.

Woods turned the trick with the last three majors of 2000 and the first of 2001. Wright captured the U.S. Women's Open and the LPGA Championship in 1961 and then picked off the 1962 Titleholders Championship and the Western Open before Murle Lindstrom stopped her streak by winning the U.S. Women's Open.

The only two players to sweep all the LPGA majors in a year were Babe Zaharias (1950, when there were only three) and Sandra Haynie (1974, one of 10 years in which there were only two majors). Pat Bradley is the last player to win three LPGA majors in a single season (1986).

Ochoa has the potential to achieve that kind of domination. Her idiosyncratic swing is tighter, her putting is more consistent and her mental discipline continues to grow.

Even back when she was having trouble closing out majors -- as recently as last year's U.S. Women's Open, she helped Cristie Kerr prevail by missing her final five fairways -- Ochoa was giving herself opportunities to win. She has finished in the top 10 in 13 of her last 17 major championships.

It's not clear how the emotional stress of her uncle's death will affect her play, but Ochoa seems to know how to turn negatives into positives. You get the feeling she might be playing for a higher cause this week. Look for Ochoa to be focused, rested (two weeks off after playing nine of the previous 11 LPGA events) and ready to go at Bulle Rock.

She'll have plenty of competition. Webb, who lost a playoff at the Ginn Tribute when she missed a 30-inch putt on the first extra hole, is once again raising her game at the right time of the year.