The unOfficial Michelle Wie News Blog

At 8:40 this morning, Michelle Wie teed off in the Sony Open trying to become the first female in 61 years to make the cut and qualify for weekend play in a men’s PGA event. Things, however, didn’t go as she had hoped.

It doesn’t look like Michelle Wie will make history this week. She fired a 9-over par 79 today and needs a miracle round tomorrow to stay in the tournament.

Wie’s trouble started early. After parring her first two holes she bogeyed her third hole and double bogeyed her fourth.

“It was just kind of tough on me when you start shooting like 3-over and stuff like that, but it wasn’t really mental,” Wie said. “I feel like I just stayed in myself while I was playing, but I guess I just kind of got a little too aggressive at some times.”

Two more double bogeys left her at 7-over par through nine holes.

“Her drives were okay, her irons were okay, just couldn’t putt,” said golf fan Don McKee. “The wind I guess or maybe the greens are so fast, but hopefully she’ll get a couple birdies more and shoot a good round tomorrow.”

Wie did card one birdie during her last nine holes, but not enough to compensate for an otherwise difficult day.

“It looked to me like she got a little too aggressive on some shots, trying to get back too many strokes all at once,” said golf analyst Mark Rolfing. “She did not have a feel for the speed of the greens at all today. And it was just an awkward day out there.”

Wie’s playing partners, tour rookie Camilo Villegas and Chris Couch both scored better than she did. That’s a change for Couch, who finished two strokes behind Wie in the 2004 Sony Open.

“I knew that and you know, I wasn’t even thinking about that,” Couch said. “But I’ll tell you a funny story. When she beat me a few years ago, I got home and my buddies had a shirt for me that said ‘I need to practice a Wie bit harder.’”

Michelle says she’ll need to do more than play a “Wie” bit better tomorrow to make the cut. She’ll have to play a lot better. But she believes there’s still hope.

“Definitely,” Wie said. “I just feel like I can do it tomorrow, because if I just do everything opposite of what I did today, I think I’m pretty set.”

Source - KGMB 9 News Hawaii

HONOLULU - For a girl with such grandiose dreams, even Michelle Wie thought the bar was set too high.

It was one of her first exercises late last year with Paul Gagne, a fitness guru who spends most of his time with hockey players, and the task was a simple pull-up. Wie jumped up to grab the bar, and her 6-foot frame dangled in the air for a few seconds before she tried to lift herself. She barely moved a few inches.

When the workout was over, Wie said she was so sore she couldn’t lift her arms to wash her hair in the shower.

“It was way too painful,” she said. “My New Year’s Resolution is to cut down on sugar and not be as lazy. That means going to the gym a lot more. My goal is to get fit, get stronger and prevent injury.”

Her ultimate goal remains the same - to play golf against the best in the world.

The next chance comes Thursday in the Sony Open, the first full-field event on the PGA Tour where Wie has become a regular fixture. It will be her seventh time competing against the men, and fourth time on the PGA Tour as she tries to become the first woman since Babe Zaharias in 1945 to make the cut.

But the junior at nearby Punahou School no longer emphasizes getting to the weekend. The older she gets, the farther along in her unique journey, she has paid less attention to results and more on hitting the right shots.

How does she measure success?

“If at the end of the week I felt good about the week, I had a lot of fun and I played as hard as I can,” she said.

Her newfound dedication to fitness is one example of Wie seeing a bigger picture.

Swing coach David Leadbetter said her upper body strength was woefully lacking, and he brought in Gagne for help. In the last few months, he said Wie has increased her ball speed about 5 mph to 161 mph, which he compared favorably with the 166 mph ball speed of Justin Rose.

Wie has added about eight pounds of muscle, which Leadbetter says has given her more strength to hold the club in the proper position at the top of the swing.

“Look at what strength training did for Annika (Sorenstam),” Leadbetter said. “Michelle tended to shy away from it. But once we pointed out the benefits, it’s a full program she has to work on. When you’ve got the talent she has, it’s a matter of getting your ducks in a row. She’s game for it. She’s starting to enjoy it.”

Even so, Wie will be measured this week by the scores on her card, and whether she finishes among the top 70 players and ties over the first two rounds.

The defending champion is Vijay Singh, and the field includes three-time Mercedes Championships winner Stuart Appleby, Mike Weir, David Toms and Adam Scott.

Scott finished behind her two years ago and paid dearly. When he got to Bay Hill, swing coach Butch Harmon had plastered pictures of Wie inside his locker.

“It’s a big week for us, a big week for me,” Scott said with a smile. “Two years ago she almost made it. If she putts really well, she can make the cut.”

Even so, the novelty is wearing off the more she plays, and the older she gets.

Three players at the Sony Open have never played a PGA Tour event, having earned their way through qualifying school. Wie already has played four tour events, and dozens of rounds at Waialae getting ready for this week.

“I was expecting a good player, but not a seasoned player,” said Sean O’Hair, the PGA Tour rookie of the year, after playing a practice round with Wie on Tuesday. “She seems like she’s been doing this a while.”

She has.

Mark Calcavecchia is among those who wonder why she doesn’t concentrate more on the LPGA Tour, where she had three runner-up finishes last year, two of them in majors. He doesn’t mind her playing the Sony Open, because Wie grew up in Honolulu and is a huge draw this week.

“I think she should try to win some LPGA tournaments first and go from there,” he said.

These are suggestions Wie has heard before, and she’s not about to change. Now that she’s a pro, she might add two more PGA Tour events this year.

“Playing with the guys has made me a better player,” she said. “With that experience and knowledge, I think it will help me win women’s events. That’s my goal - to win with the women’s events.”

Leadbetter wouldn’t put a timetable on when that might happen, although the sooner the better. The last time Wie hoisted a trophy was as a 13-year-old at the U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links. He said one problem was her schedule, which includes nine months of high school.

“You don’t set the goal to win,” he said. “You set the goal of becoming more proficient, hitting more fairways, becoming a better putter. There’s no doubt she’s going to win, and when she wins, she’s going to win a lot.”

Meanwhile, Wie has shifted her attention to the journey instead of the score. That meant listening to her parents, which is not easy for a teenager.

“My parents would say that and I would think, ‘It’s the results that matter,’” she said. “But as I get older, I’m realizing it’s the road you take that’s the most important thing. There is so much to learn from the guys. They have so much to offer, and I’m soaking it all in.”

Source - Sun Herald

HONOLULU — A 79 was not the springboard she was looking for to launch her first full season as a pro. But how much of a setback has Michelle Wie suffered in her quest to play against PGA Tour players?
“You never know,” said Camilo Villegas, who was paired with Wie and Chris Couch for the first two rounds. “I’m sure she’s down about it. She’s only 16 and she’s going to keep learning. She’s got a lot of pressure on her, but she handled herself well out there.”

Wie has said one of her goals is to crossover someday and play on the PGA Tour. But at her hometown (and now sponsor) Sony Open, she’s headed backward, missing the cut by one stroke in 2004, seven shots last year and opening with a 9-over-par round Thursday. (Related item: Sony Open scores)

“Some guys don’t like it. But if she can make it out here, I’d love to see it,” Couch said. “Look at what it’s done for this tournament. If you’re going to give anyone an exemption, it might as well be her.”

Other top tournaments agree. Sunday night, Team Wie will hold a press conference where she’s expected to accept another invitation to play the Casio World Open, a Japan Tour event in which Wie missed the cut by a stroke last November. This week, the Kraft Nabisco Championship tweaked its exemption criteria so Wie, Morgan Pressel and Brittany Lang could join the field for the LPGA Tour’s first major in March.

The clamor will continue. For now, though, it’s back to the LPGA Tour for Wie, who’s expected to play eight events off six allowed exemptions plus the Weetabix Women’s British Open and U.S. Women’s Open.

Wie, 16 and a high school junior, will follow a similar path as she did as an amateur, meaning classes and a patchwork schedule that she believes affected her sharpness at the Sony Open.

“I didn’t really feel any pressure,” she said. “The hard part for me was I haven’t played in a tournament since November. And just going into this event, I know it’s kind of a big event and just not being able to kind of put myself out there in a real tournament. The last time was in November. I know all of the guys out there, it’s their first tournament. It’s kind of hard for me just to go out there and not having played.”

She will play one of two consecutive LPGA events next month in Hawaii, either the SBS Open (Feb. 16-18), where she finished second by two shots last year, or the inaugural Fields Open (Feb. 23-25).

Beyond that, she’s probably headed to the Safeway International (tied for 12th last year) in Superstition Mountain, Ariz., and the Kraft Nabisco Championship, the LPGA’s first major in Rancho Mirage, Calif., where she tied for 14th.

“She’s got all of our respect,” said Jeff Sluman, who opened with a 67. “We understand how difficult it is out here. She’s going to win a lot of tournaments in her lifetime. Everybody should just let it happen and let her progress. The answer will come five years down the road, not these seven tournaments (vs. men pros).”

Indeed, several players circled around Wie like protective older brothers.

“I don’t think it adds any more pressure on the tournament director or creates any resentment,” said Rory Sabbatini, who set the early first-round pace with a 5-under 65. “Hey, I’ve had tournaments where I’ve shot 89 in the first rounds, and I was top 80 in the world rankings. That’s just part of competitive golf and she’ll get over it.”

Source - USA Today

Anybody catch Mark Rolfing’s Golf Hawaii last night on the Golf Channel? He had Michelle Wie as a guest, and asked her “which would give you more satisfaction, making the cut in a PGA tournament, or winning on the LGPA?”

Way to put her on the spot, Mark!

Let’s see: choose to make the PGA cut and tick off the entire LGPA membership: “What, we’re not good enough now?”

Or

Opt for the LPGA win and hear the jeers: “So much for your goal of playing on the PGA Tour someday!”

But Michelle wasn’t falling for it. With her usual finesse, she replied, “I would choose both. Winning an LPGA tournament would be awesome because it’s something I’ve always wanted to do. And making the cut on the PGA would be a whole different feeling, to be able to do something no one else has ever done.”

Well, actually, plenty of people make the cut, at every single PGA tournament in fact. And as far as women go, Babe Didriksen Zaharias did it, but that was 60 years ago, so maybe it doesn’t count anymore.

Mark Rolfing did get one thing right. He declared, “Michelle WILL win a tournament this year.” I’m with you, Mark. And we’ll all have fun watching when it happens.

Source - TravelGolf.com

The LPGA Tour made an exception yesterday for 17-year-old Morgan Pressel, accepting her as a member instead of making her wait until she turns 18 three months after the season begins.

The decision means that Pressel, a senior at St. Andrews School in Boca Raton, Fla., can play wherever she is eligible and have her earnings count on the money list and toward the LPGA Tour’s new playoff system that splits the year in two parts.

“This is good news,” said her grandfather, Herb Krickstein. “We’re very happy about it.”

Pressel likely won’t play more than a half-dozen times before she graduates because of demands at school, although Krickstein said she might start the season in Hawai’i at the SBS Open because “that’s not a bad place to be.”

Honolulu’s Michelle Wie, 16, finished tied for second at last year’s SBS Open at Turtle Bay. Wie is not expected to join the LPGA Tour until she turns 18.

Former commissioner Ty Votaw rejected Pressel’s petition in June that she be allowed to join the LPGA Tour, if she qualifies, before turning 18. Pressel easily earned her card at LPGA Tour qualifying school two weeks ago. She asked the LPGA to reconsider the day after that.

“Morgan is an exceptionally talented young player who will be a terrific addition to the 2006 LPGA Tour,” commissioner Carolyn Bivens said.

Pressel is the second teen to receive an exemption from the LPGA’s age limit. Votaw allowed Aree Song to join at age 17 two years ago, although she had already graduated high school.

Source - Honolulu Advertiser