At the first major championship of the LPGA Tour season – a season unlike any other – it was a first-time winner who topped a world-class field at Royal Troon.
Sophia Popov, who just recently caddied for a fellow competitor and had no real status on the LPGA Tour, won the AIG Women’s Open by two shots.
She came into the final round with a three-shot lead and never surrendered, despite opening her day with a bogey on the first hole.
Popov’s 7-under total (70-72-67-68) was one of only four under-par scores on the week at Troon.
With tears in her eyes Popov knocked in her final putt from just a few inches to seal the victory.
“I almost quit playing last year,” Popov said after her win. “Thank God I didn’t.”
https://twitter.com/AIGWomensOpen/status/1297585504104468480
A WILD JOURNEY TO THE WOMEN’S OPEN
The dual-citizen (German and American) caddied for friend Anne van Dam at the LPGA Drive On Championship – at the first event back on the LPGA Tour’s schedule – with local caddies unavailable due to COVID-19 restrictions.
The next week Popov was in the final pairing of the Symetra Tour’s Founders Tribute at Longbow Golf Club and finished one-shot back of the winning total.
She ended up earning a spot in the Women’s Open thanks to a T9 result at the Marathon LPGA Classic presented by Dana the following week. The only reason she got into that event in the first place is because the LPGA Tour needed to fill up some spots with Symetra Tour players due to many LPGA regulars taking a pass.
Popov’s T9 at the Marathon LPGA Classic marked her first ever top-10 finish on the LPGA Tour and earned her a spot in the Women’s Open for the second time – following her debut as an amateur in 2011.
She had only one practice round at Royal Troon before Thursday’s opening round.
“When I came over here, I told myself, ‘the British was a bonus event’ because technically it was never on my schedule this year,” said Popov. “So I was just excited and happy to be playing at all.”
FROM TROON, ARIZONA TO TROON, SCOTLAND
Funny enough, Popov won an event on the Cactus Tour (a mini-tour for women that plays events in Arizona, on which Popov won three times during the COVID-19 break) in May at Troon North Golf Club. She received just over $2,000 for that triumph.
For her win Sunday at Royal Troon she pocketed a cool $675,000, a major championship title, and perhaps more importantly, full-time LPGA Tour status.
Popov was a rookie on the LPGA Tour in 2015 but lost her card after the 2019 season and didn’t reacquire status via the LPGA’s Q-Series last fall.
Popov became the first female to win a major after being ranked outside the top-300 in the world (Ben Curtis won The Open Championship in 2003 as the 396th-ranked male golfer in the world).
She was also the longest shot to win a major in the LPGA Tour’s history – Anna Nordqvist was ranked 221st when she won the 2009 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship.
Jasmine Suwannapura finished runner-up at 5-under while Minjee Lee finished third at 3-under. Former world No. 1 Inbee Park finished at 1-under while American Austin Ernst rounded out the top five, finishing at even par for the week.
CANADIAN UPDATE – WHERE WILL BROOKE PLAY NEXT?
Canada’s Alena Sharp finished tied for 22nd after steady rounds of 71-74-73-72. Her T22 finish was her best result at the Women’s Open (besting her T23 all the way back in 2007).
Golf Town athlete Brooke Henderson shot rounds of 77-75 to miss the cut in her return to the LPGA Tour after being off since mid-January due to COVID-19. This was her first missed cut at a major championship.
The Brooke Brigade won’t have to wait long to see Brooke tee it up again, though!
The LPGA Tour heads back to the U.S. next week for the Walmart NW Arkansas Championship presented by P&G, followed by the ANA Inspiration – another major on the calendar – and Brooke tells us she’ll be playing both of those events.