LPGA Champ Michelle Wie

I met Michelle Wie at the Grace Korean Church in Fullerton, CA, many thanks to Asiance for hooking me up with the interview. I have been an admirer of Wie’s for a long time and actually attend the exact same church where the interview was being conducted. Michelle Wie will turn 21 in three weeks.

I remember her as the little girl from Hawaii who started getting headlines when she was 10 and actually winning local tournaments about the same time. On Oct. 11 she can have her first legal beer.

Michelle Wie started playing golf at the age of 4. Even at that young age she was able to hit the ball 100 yards off the tee, a sign of things to come. By the time she was 10, she was making huge noise in Hawaii. At that age she made her first try at qualifying for the PGA tour event held there. While she did not come close to qualifying, shooting an 84, it was still an amazing achievement. That year, 2000, she also became the youngest girl to ever qualify for a USGA event, in this case the US Women’s Public Links Championship.

By the time she was 12, Wie had grown to nearly six feet in height, and was frequently blasting drives in excess of 300 yards. The PGA pros that got a look at her were astonished; Tom Lehman gave her the nickname ‘The Big Wiesy’, because, like Ernie Els (aka the Big Easy), her swing was smooth and powerful. In January of 2002, she made history again by qualifying for the LPGA’s Takefuji Classic, the youngest to ever do so. Though she missed the cut, it was a good learning experience for her.

In 2003, she tried again to qualify for the Sony Open. This time she shot a 73 and finished 47th out of 96 players. This got her so much notoriety that she was offered a plethora of LPGA sponsor exemptions throughout the season.

This, combined with an amazing 9th place finish at the Nabisco Championship a few weeks later, propelled Michelle into the media spotlight; she is arguably the best known of all the players on this site, though she is still (probably) years away from turning pro!

Michelle ended up playing many LPGA events throughout the year, making the cut in all but one of them. She also played two men’s events, though she did not come close to making the cut in either one. Unfortunately, she played relatively few amateur and girl’s events, but did manage to win one of them, the prestigious Women’s Public Links Championship (again the youngest ever to do so). This was her first significant national level title.

2005 was another great year for Wie. Although she did not do so well at her second attempt at the Sony Open, later in the year she was given another PGA exemption into the John Deere field. With just a few holes to go in round 2, she was several shots below the cut, and looked assured of making it. But then she made a couple of key mistakes, and once again just missed the cut. She had another chance against the men a few months later, at the Men’s Public Links, where she shocked everyone by making it to the quarterfinals before being eliminated. Had she won that, she would have qualified for a trip to the Masters.
Meanwhile, she posted her best finishes ever on the LPGA tour. She finished second at the first event of the year, in Hawaii, and at the second Major of the year, the LPGA Championship, she not only became the first non-LPGA member to be allowed to play, she finished by herself in second place behind Annika Sorenstam. She was tied for the lead at the US Women’s Open going into the final day, but did not do very well on Sunday, and finished tied for third at the British Open.

Michelle turned pro just after her 16th birthday, and immediately thereafter signed huge endorsement deals with Nike and Sony. She is not interested for the moment in joining the LPGA tour full time, although she will continue to play a number of times on that tour during the year. In her first event as a pro, the 2005 Samsung World Championship, she played well, but an illegal drop in the third round forced her disqualification.

In 2006, she continued her pro career, and unlike her problems at the Samsung, she could seemingly do no wrong. She finished third at the Fields Open, then contended in the first three Majors on tour. She finished in the top ten in every LPGA event she played through July in 2006. She also managed to finally make a cut on a men’s tour: she finished tied for 35th at the SK Telecom event on the Asian tour. Thus, the only living women to make the cut at a men’s tour event are she and Se Ri Pak, who finished tied for 10th at a KPGA event in 2003.

Wie’s game took a marked downturn towards the end of 2006. It started when she was forced to drop out of a PGA event due to dehydration. She went on to finish virtually last in the next couple of men’s events she played. Even when she played a women’s event, the Samsung, she was not competitive. As she reached 17 years of age, she was mired in the first slump of her career.

Michelle graduated from high school in 2007 and, in the fall, went to Stanford. That was about the only positive news she had all year. On the golf course, she had a disastrous time. Her wrist injury forced her to miss several months of tournaments, including the year’s first Major, the Nabisco. When she returned to action at the Ginn Open, she played so poorly that she was in last place when she was forced to bow out. Instead of challenging for wins thereafter, she was frequently struggling just to finish the event or make the cut. Even when she did make the cut, she would finish last in the field among those who did. Wie only broke par twice in 2007, and made less than $10,000 on the course.

In her very first tournament of the year, in her home state of Hawaii, Wie very nearly won. She faded at the end of the final round, however, and finished second. She had a few more top fives after that, but was never quite able to get the win. She finally broke through in her final LPGA event of the season, the Lorena Ochoa Invitational, winning for the first time since she won the Pub Links as a 13 year old.

From January 2006 to January 2007, she participated in four men’s tournaments, missing the cut in three and withdrawing from one. She played the Sony Open, her first PGA Tour event, when she was only 15 years old. Many have criticized her decision to tee it up against the men, arguing that she should have focused on the LPGA Tour from the start.

On August 29, 2010, she posted a three-shot win over a full field at the CN Canadian Women’s Open, held at St. Charles Country Club in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for her second career professional victory.[63] In her next LPGA event, she finished second in the 54-hole P&G NW Arkansas Championship two weeks later, shooting 201 (-12) but losing to Yani Tseng by one stroke after giving up an overnight three-stroke lead.

Wie entering her fourth year at Stanford (due to her golf obligations, Wie requires a fifth year). This means that fans of Wie are unlikely to see her tee it up competitively for at least the next five weeks.

She is scheduled to play the Sime Darby LPGA Malaysia event in Kuala Lumpur, and the LPGA Hana Bank Championship in South Korea. Both events take place in late October.

The interview went pretty smooth even though the venue was pretty hectic. Before the interview, she spoke at a college convention for high school and junior high students. She mainly talked about college life during her panel, and how it’s important to focus on academics. She mentioned that she keeps herself pretty busy with her professional golf career and school. And sorry guys, I tried to ask her about Tiger Woods but she came back with a “No Comment”.

ASIANCE: Who was the most influential person for you in terms of golf?

Michelle: The most influential people are my family. They have always been there for me and have been very supportive.

ASIANCE: Yeah, It’s always good to surround yourself with positive people. What do you like to do on your free time?

Michelle: Go out, hang out with friends… At Stanford there are a lot of on campus activities and things going on, so it’s fun to check them out once in a while.

ASIANCE: If you weren’t a pro golfer, what would you be doing?

Michelle: I would probably be teaching or become a professor.

ASIANCE: What are your plans if and when you retire?

Michelle: I’m not too sure, I’d probably travel a lot, but I have no plans as of now!

I just wanted to say thanks so much for letting me interview Michelle! I had a great time and it was awesome meeting her!